I don’t know about you, but my social media feed is filled with stuff that is supposed to “give me more energy” to get through perimenopause. What does that even mean?

Perimenopause isn’t causing fatigue for no reason. Your body is doing things: some are new, and some are a sort of inverse callback to your teenage years. Yeah, that’s right – menopause is like a second puberty. Fun!

This is work. It’s like remodeling your house while you live inside it. There’s a lot to change, a lot to update, some things to take offline, and all of it happens while you’re in the midst of your daily needs for function, repair, healing, and growth. Those never truly stop, but the demands of the remodel can make them all slow down, or get more difficult.

In this episode, Katja shares herbs who will do some of the work for you. By reducing inflammation in the blood vessels and in the digestive tract, and by keeping your lymphatic system flowing smoothly, you can free up a lot of resources inside the body so that your internal workload is lower. In a sense they serve to enhance your inner clean-up crews and help them function more efficiently. (It would be nice if they would also clean your actual house, but alas.)

It doesn’t take stimulants or adaptogens to do this job. We don’t always need to solve feeling tired by going to the buzzy herbs.

So if you’re feeling tied, but you don’t even have time to take a nap, at least these herbs can do some of your work for you!

Here are the links Katja talked about in this video:

• The Reproductive Health course, which includes not just peri/menopause, but also everything else – endometriosis, PCOS/PMOS, managing your cycle, and more. Also prostate health and andropause: reproductive health for everyone!
• Our full course catalog – everything we offer. (Yep, there’s a lot.)
• Our favorite gluten free/dairy free cinnamon buns. These are SO GOOD.
• Our gluten free / dairy free substitutes list. Tons of options so you don’t have to feel deprived as you change up your diet!

Everything’s on sale in July…

Oops, July 2026 is over, but this sale is semi-annual: every July and December we have a 20% off sale so that students who need a discount for any reason can depend on 20% off twice a year with no means testing – you don’t have to qualify or have a reason, you just get 20% off, every July and every December.

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Use code CATNIP at checkout to get 20% off!

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Episode Transcript

Katja (00:15):
Hi, I’m Katja. And I’m here at Commonwealth Holistic Herbalism in Boston, Massachusetts. All right, so today I want to talk about perimenopause, which is a huge topic. But this started because I had posted on social media about a lot of my friends who are in perimenopause are just so tired. And a bunch of them are getting tests to try to figure out what’s out of balance that’s making them tired. Is it minerals, or vitamins, or hormones, or whatever? And there’s a bajillion tests you can get. And they’re like well, we’re so tired. Something must be off. And in this post I was saying that I don’t think that the levels that are out of balance are actually inside us. I think that they are outside us with all the pressure to perform, and to produce, and to do more, and optimize, and maximize, and all that stuff that there is no time to rest. Now, obviously in perimenopause, of course things are out of balance. I mean, that is kind of the whole point. This is just puberty again. So, I’m not saying that a test is totally useless, or irrelevant, or any of those things. I just suddenly one day I was really struck with like hold on, the thing that’s out of balance is rest.

(01:48):
So, that’s what I want to talk about today. And specifically, I’m just going to tell you right off the bat, even though it would be great if we all got more sleep, and if we could stop and take a nap, and had time to stare out the window, and everything else, that’s not what this episode is about because none of us has time to do that. So instead we’re going to be focusing on much, much easier to accomplish versions of rest and how herbs can help us do that. But first, I have two things for you. Today is Thursday, July 30th, which means that there’s still about a day and a half left of our 20% off sale for this July. So, if you want to get any of our courses 20% off, now is the time, right now. Don’t wait. Do it right now. Go to online.commonwealthherbs.com. Use code CATNIP. Get 20% off. And because this is an episode about perimenopause, I suggest the Reproductive Health course, which has everything. Not just about perimenopause, but also about endometriosis, and PCOS, which isn’t PCOS anymore, and just regular old menstrual cruddiness and every possible thing. Fibroids, and cysts, and also BPH, and prostate stuff. We got all the reproductive systems going on in here. So, grab that. It’s at online.commonwealthherbs.com. Use code CATNIP, get 20% off until the end of the month. Okay.

(03:39):
And the second thing that I want to tell you is our reclaimer, which is I’m not a doctor. I’m an herbalist and a holistic health educator. The ideas discussed on this podcast do not constitute medical advice. No state or federal authority licenses herbalists in the United States. So, these discussions are for educational purposes only. I want to remind you that good health doesn’t mean the same thing for everyone. Good health doesn’t even exist as an objective standard. It is influenced by your individual needs, your experiences, your goals, your whole health history, everything that’s coming in your future, your genetics history. It is influenced by so many factors, which means that we are not attempting to present a single, dogmatic right way that everyone should adhere to. Good thing, because that would be impossible. Okay. Everyone’s body is different. So, the things that we’re talking about may or may not apply directly to you. But we hope that they’ll give you some good ideas to think about and some stuff to research and experiment with further. All right. And finding your way to better health is both your right and also your responsibility. That doesn’t mean you’re alone on the journey, and it definitely does not mean that you’re to blame for your current state of health. But it does mean that the final decision when you’re considering any course of therapy, whether it is discussed on the internet or prescribed by a physician, is always your choice to make. And because it’s your choice to make, that also means that you need to have enough information to make that choice. So, make sure that whoever you’re working with, stand up for yourself and don’t be pressured into a decision until you have all the information.

Yes, You’re Tired, But Stimulants Aren’t the Answer

(05:24):
All right. So, when we’re thinking about these tests to figure out like ugh, everything’s off. I feel so tired. What needs to be fixed? We’re thinking about the problem as a molecular imbalance. We are testing something at a micro-level, at the cellular level. And that’s not bad or wrong, but we aren’t seeing the whole picture when we do that. So yes, there may be levels off in your body, and in fact certainly there are, right? Because perimenopause, and also you’ve lived a whole life. Do you have all the minerals that you need? Probably not. Do you have all the phytochemical goodness from lots of different colors of vegetable every single day that you need? Probably not. This is real life. None of us has every single thing that we need packed into all of our cells. So yeah, you probably will find some imbalance in there. But if we only look for it at that molecular level, then we won’t see the whole picture. We won’t recognize that the problem might actually be that we’re tired because we’re not getting enough rest. And if we don’t see that, then we can’t change that. Don’t worry. I’m still not going to tell you to take a nap, although it would be great.

(06:50):
Now, normally the strategies that are offered to support us, especially if you’re scrolling around on social media or something, are like adaptogens. So, specifically ginseng, and rhodiola, and eleuthero. And you might hear about he shou wu or different stimulating adaptogens to give you energy so that you don’t feel so tired so that you can do all your stuff. Okay, hold on a second. And this is just a little tangent, but I do think it’s important. Give you energy. Wait, we could put coffee in that list too, right, because they’re all doing the same by different mechanisms. They’re all doing the same thing. These are all stimulating herbs, but they’re not giving you anything. They’re not saying like oh, here is the magical energy molecule. They’re not saying here’s a giant pile of minerals for you. You’re going to need that. None of that stuff. They’re just stimulating your body to grind harder. They are revving up your engine, but they didn’t give you any fuel. They just revved the engine. And so that’s not a really great strategy. And if you are sitting there with a cup of coffee listening to this, no judgment. Have the caffeine, have the rhodiola, have the whatever. But it’s important for us to just recognize that they are not giving you energy. They are forcing you to rev your engine but not giving you any fuel. Okay. So, that’s not a strategy that I want to employ over a long term. Sure, on any given day, I may grab some kind of caffeine or stimulating adaptogen. But in terms of long-term success, long-term perimenopause survival, I don’t think that’s a super great option. So. I am looking for how can we get more rest? And since we’re all too busy to sleep more, then the next question is what herbs can give us rest in other forms?

Perimenopause is Like Puberty or Home Renovations

(09:10):
Okay. Let’s take a step back for a second because I do want to be really clear here that perimenopause is puberty. We had so much fun the first time. We are doing it again, right? No. But it’s really no different. The first time we went through puberty, we were bringing the reproductive system online. This time going through puberty, we are taking it offline. But it’s the same procedure. It’s the same amount of work. It is literally a renovation inside your body. Except when we were teenagers, we had a lot more energy. We were younger. We didn’t have so many responsibilities. We didn’t have rent to pay. So, now we’re older. We’re doing this whole puberty thing again. And we don’t have as much energy as we did when we were 13, or 15, or whatever, 12, whenever it was for you. And so what that results in is everyone looking for ways to make it go away. To make the symptoms of perimenopause go away because we’re supposed to be productive every day at this age.

(10:24):
But hold on a second. We don’t do that to teenagers. Yeah, they get grumpy. Yeah, they sleep until noon. Yeah, they this and that and whatever. But we don’t try to make it so that doesn’t happen to them. We just say well yeah, that’s puberty. They get pimples, and we help them with that, but it is also just a normal part of puberty. They get moody. Well, I don’t like that, but it’s a part of puberty. They don’t like it either. Nobody likes it. Don’t worry. But it’s kind of like this is just a transition that we have to make. We just have to do it. It doesn’t happen overnight, which is honestly good because if it did happen overnight, this is a big shift. If it did happen overnight, that would be – I don’t know – I think we’d have to do it like butterflies. We’d have to crawl into a cocoon and then crawl back out again. We’d have to shut down everything. But humans don’t work that way. I don’t know. I think maybe I might like to crawl into a cocoon. Actually, that kind of sounds cool. Whatever. Humans don’t work that way.

(11:40):
And so literally, I want you to think about perimenopause like having your kitchen renovated while you’re still living in your house. They’re coming in, they’re taking out the cabinets, they’re putting in new cabinets, a new sink, a new dishwasher. Oh, you can’t wash dishes today. Oh, there’s no oven today. Oh, there’s whatever. And it’s loud, and it’s dusty, and they’re making a mess everywhere. And sure, afterwards you’re going to have a new kitchen, and that’s great. But it is not easy to live in the house while they’re doing the renovations to the house. Even if it was just painting a single room of your house, that’s a huge amount of work. And it’s not easy to live with that. But also, if we tried to do it in one moment, I don’t know. Probably we would explode or something because the to-do list is just too big. There’s too many steps in this process to do it immediately. Which means it takes time and we already had our to-do list. That to-do list though, that to-do list is for society. Is it really for us? It’s about our obligations to society. And some of those obligations are great, like helping out your neighbor who’s getting older and whatever. Some of those obligations are less fun. I just have to do this job so that I can pay the bills because #adulting. Okay, that’s not very fun. And that’s a place where now I’m back to my cocoon idea. That seems really good.

(13:23):
But the point here is that we have this external to-do list. And now we’re coming into this phase of our lives or we’re solidly in it where we have this internal to-do list too, and we can’t escape it. There’s nothing that you can do to escape it. It is just going to make you tired. It has a cost. It has a cost. Renovation is the best analogy for this. And so that’s why I keep coming back to this idea of rest. Even when I’m just thinking about this isn’t very fun. It isn’t, but we have to do it. And so the most supportive way to get through it is rest. Okay, but we can’t. Maybe you can spend time staring at a window while you’re not doing anything productive. And if you can, do it. That is so good for you. But maybe you can’t. Maybe you can’t take a nap. Maybe you can’t go to bed early. Maybe you could go to bed earlier than you think, but maybe it still isn’t early enough. So, I don’t think that there’s much worth in harping on those things. If you can move the needle there, do.

Ways to Rest Beyond Sleep

(14:45):
But I want to be thinking about rest in other forms. So, one of these is the idea of metabolic rest. So, we can think about the work that our body has to do to digest our food and how many systems are involved in that work. So, if we’re digesting broccoli, okay. The digestive system is doing work to digest that broccoli, but it’s fairly contained. And it takes energy to digest it, but it’s like a reasonably straightforward thing. If we’re digesting fish or – I don’t know – chicken, whatever, these are all yeah, it takes energy to do it. But it’s fairly straightforward and fairly contained in the digestive system. Okay. But when we’re digesting sugar and carbs, there’s a lot more work there. And it bleeds over into more systems. There’s metabolic work. There’s inflammatory work. There’s a lot of stuff that happens when we eat high-sugar, high-carb diet. But it’s perimenopause, and we want the high sugar and the high carbs. And that’s natural. It’s normal. It does not mean that you are undisciplined. It does not mean that you’re a bad person. It doesn’t mean any of those things. Please have the cinnamon bun if you want the cinnamon bun. I have a really good gluten-free recipe for gluten-free, dairy-free cinnamon buns that I found. And it really works, and it’s fantastic. So, I will link it in the show notes for you. But my point is that I don’t want to guilt anybody because you’re craving sugar. It’s puberty. Of course you’re craving sugar. But what can we do to reduce the impact on your internal workload that is caused by that sugar? Okay. That’s work that herbs can do. That’s work I’m really interested in because that’s a place where we can get some rest without having to quit our day jobs or whatever else. So, this is kind of defining work as active processing internally, like metabolic processing or inflammatory processing, like different kinds of physiological processes.

(17:12):
Also mental ones, right? Mental processing also is a lot of work. And so that’s an area that I don’t think I’m going to get into too much today because I have a lot of herbs that already are on my list. But right off the bat, if we limit the amount of stuff going in, then we limit the amount of stuff we have to process. And that doesn’t mean that you have to live in a box with no social media and no whatever. But maybe during this time you limit yourself to like very little social media. And instead you just fill all of your input time with herb stuff because that’s uplifting and helpful. And it’s easier to process than all the drama and all the pain, and suffering, and whatever else that you’re going to see when you look out in the world. It’s important to know that stuff is happening, but just right today you need a little rest. And so we can maybe not look at that today. Okay.

(18:15):
All right. So that’s like a whole other episode. We’re not going to talk about that today. But let’s really think about okay, so the metabolic rest in terms of helping our body with the work of digestion so that we can make that work more efficient and free up resources to go work somewhere else. That’s what happens when you rest. Okay. We can also reduce inflammation. That is an area where we can really buy ourselves a lot of wiggle room. And it is a place where herbs can make a huge difference. And this is like all kinds of inflammation. So, if you have been thinking a lot about histamine overreactions and mast cell activation syndrome, that kind of stuff. Yes, we can make a huge difference there. If you’re thinking about some chronic inflammatory problem, whether it’s like rheumatoid arthritis, or fibromyalgia, or whatever. Yes, we can make a huge difference there. All of these different things are places where herbs can really move the needle.

Addressing All Aspects of the Inflammatory Cascade

(19:26):
And the thing is that really no part of the inflammatory cascade happens in a vacuum. If we focus on one little part – oh, I’m just thinking about histamines – we’re missing the fact that the entire rest of the cascade is going along with it. And that actually is really good. When we take that step back, and we say well, it isn’t just histamines. It’s like the entire inflammatory response, the entire inflammatory cascade. That gives us more places where we can hook in and do our work. So, that’s actually really, really good. So, we’re going to do that. And I am going to take a tiny tangent here to say the two biggest causes of inflammation are… No matter what kind of diagnosis you do or don’t have for an inflammatory state, the two biggest causes are not getting enough sleep and eating pro-inflammatory foods. Eating foods that are creating inflammation in the body, whether that’s sugar, or foods that you have a sensitivity to that you are eating anyway, or whatever else. And we’ve already established that there’s no time to get more sleep, at least for the purposes of this episode. And also right now you’re probably really busy. And so this might not be the time for you to try going gluten-free and dairy-free or whatever other food sensitivities might be on your plate. Although it is a good idea to do that as soon as you have a little energy to do it.

(21:07):
But I do just kind of have to say that these two things are the two biggest drivers of inflammation, like all-cause inflammation, just so that I have like integrity in this episode. And so when you have some time, they are worth investigating. And the reason that they are such big targets or whatever is that if you have something going on in your body, like an autoimmune state or whatever. Or some mast cell thing that comes before the destabilization and the activation. Maybe it’s just a little hypersensitivity or whatever. Even like it’s seasonal allergies, and you have that predisposition to the hypersensitivity. All that is something that the body can often smooth over. But then when you put not enough sleep in the mix. And then when you put the inflammatory load of sugar, or canola oil, or foods that you have sensitivity to into the mix. That’s what blows everything up. And so okay, now we have said it. That was our word from our sponsor. We’ve done the thing. We’re moving on.

(22:29):
So, it’s definitely worth trying to cut sugar out from the diet when you can but not feeling guilty when you can’t. It’s definitely worth trying to get rid of the pro-inflammatory foods. Gluten and dairy are two of the biggest ones. And other stuff like soy oil and canola oil are also two really big culprits. Which those are hard things to do. But on the other hand, these days there are so many products that are actually pretty good that you could just swap. You don’t have to change your habits. You could just be like oh, I’m going to get the good gluten-free bread, and I’m going to have my sandwich that way instead. I have a whole list of substitutes that are really good, so I’ll put that in the show notes. Or to say okay, I won’t cook with canola oil anymore. I’ll get avocado oil, whatever. Okay, that’s not a huge thing. There’s some energy there and some planning involved. But once you do it, and you’ve just made that switch, and it’s a habit, then that’s not so bad. So, do that when you have time. Do that when you have energy. But for now, let’s talk about herbs that will just plain help and that you can kind of set up in the background and not really have to think about very much.

(23:47):
All right. So first we’re going to think about herbs that help with inflammation because that is such a core energy sink in the body. And so you might be thinking, oh, she’s going to talk about turmeric now. I’m not actually. Turmeric can help with inflammation, but it’s really targeting inflammation in the digestive tract. And so if you have inflammation there, and if you enjoy eating turmeric or drinking it, then do that for sure. But it’s not practical to try to make turmeric be responsible for your whole inflammatory reduction task list because it’s really not good at that. It’s really good at the digestive tract. Also, pretty good at skin too. If you have like a wound or something like that, and you put it on your skin, it’s pretty good at that. That’s what it’s good at. So, I don’t want to try to make it do more than that, which means I’ve got other herbs on this list.

Inflammation From Too Much Sugar/Carbs

(24:48):
So, we’re going to break down inflammation into a couple little categories here. Categories that are super common for anybody in perimenopause. And the first one is inflammation from eating too much sugar and carbs. Comfort food is real. Have the comfort food. Have the vegetables when you can, get the protein, get the good fats, all those things, but don’t feel bad about the comfort food. Instead, just take cinnamon and tulsi. All right. So, I want to preface this with if you are a medicated diabetic, then this is not unsafe as long as you are testing every day. It’s a pain in the butt to test your glucose levels. And a lot of times you kind of get to the place where you have habits, and your routine is the same, and you can start to feel when things are changing. And so yeah, you don’t want to poke yourself in the finger over and over and over again. I get it. But if you’re a medicated diabetic, and you want to try cinnamon or tulsi, then during the time that you are trying it, make sure that you are testing. Because they are so effective that they may change your medication requirements.

(26:13):
So, if you’re taking Metformin or any of the not insulin type of diabetes medications, and you work regularly with cinnamon or tulsi with consistent doses and consistently every day, you may need to change the dose that you take of the Metformin. And so if you are testing every day, then you will see that. And then you’ll call your doctor, and you’ll say hey, my glucose levels are changing. I think we might need to adjust my dose. I need to make an appointment. And then your doctor will look at your glucose levels and say ah yes, your glucose levels are changing. Excellent. Okay, we can reduce your dose, and here’s your new prescription. As long as you’re doing that, then this is totally safe. If you are a medicated diabetic who’s taking insulin, then you are probably testing more frequently. And the key here is that, again, it’s not going to mean that you don’t need insulin. But it may reduce the number of units that you take at any given time. And so it’s really important to be testing so that you’re getting your units right. Okay. So, now we’ve got safety out of the way, cinnamon and tulsi.

(27:27):
I personally like cinnamon as a capsule because it’s just easier, and we’re all really busy. So, there are various things here that kind of have to be as tea in my list here as I move forward. But cinnamon, it’s totally fine to take as a capsule. And so I kind of feel like I’m just going to do that because it’s one less thing to think about. Right now I get cinnamon capsules from New Chapter. And also my tulsi capsules are from New Chapter as well. They don’t give me anything to say that, but that’s just the one that I’m taking right now. But any of the really good-quality capsules. And the thing here is that both cinnamon and tulsi help your body stay sensitive to insulin. When we eat a lot of sugar, then it’s kind of like there’s so much of it to process that the cells get a little bit overwhelmed. And so they start desensitizing to the process of accepting more sugar into themselves. They start saying ugh, no, I’m not going to answer the door. I’m not answering the telephone. I’m not answering anyone. I just don’t want to. And so both cinnamon and tulsi help that process to not happen. They help those cells to stay sensitive.

(29:02):
Now, having all that sugar still is an issue, fine, but it keeps us further away from a state of insulin resistance. Insulin resistance is like the first step. And then there’s pre-diabetes, and then there’s diabetes. And so if we can keep ourselves away from that state, then that’s really good. So, if you’re a person who doesn’t eat sugar very often. But then one day you just are like it’s the worst day ever. I am eating a whole tray of cinnamon buns, whatever it is. Then okay, take cinnamon that day. But if you’re like no, the reality is yeah, I don’t always eat great. And it’s true. I eat more carbs and more sugar than I probably should, and that’s just life right now. Then just cinnamon every day. It’s going to help you. I take both cinnamon and tulsi. Both of them will help with the insulin resistance not becoming a factor or keeping you away from the insulin resistance part. But tulsi has the extra benefit of keeping your mind in a better place. And I did an episode not too far back about tulsi and kind of really leaning on that, me personally really leaning on that lately. And just go ahead, take a lot. Take a lot. Take a lot. It’ll keep you steady.

Inflammation in the Vasculature

(30:39):
All right. So that’s inflammation metabolically. But let’s also think about inflammation in the vasculature. That’s the blood vessels. That’s a huge thing in perimenopause for a few reasons. First off, we’re 50. There’s wear and tear. Some of us are older than 50. There’s wear and tear going on. We’ve had a whole lifetime of wear and tear. And any kind of wear and tear in the vasculature, that’s inflammation. We can also think about so many of us work at jobs where we sit at a desk. And just sitting for long periods of time creates damage in the blood vessels. It creates wear and tear because those blood vessels are bent for long periods of time. And I’m not kidding. The red blood cells, they kind of crash into. So, if your knee is bent or any part of you is bent, they kind of crash into the side, and then they go around the corner when you have that 90-degree angle or whatever. And you really do get a little damage on the inside of the blood vessel wall. It’s kind of like if you were throwing a Frisbee down a hallway, and the hallway had like a bend in it. And the Frisbee just kept bonking into the drywall, and then it’s making damage in the drywall there.

(32:04):
So, this isn’t a problem. I mean, humans have been sitting forever since before we were human actually. And so it’s not like if you sit even for one minute, your blood vessels are ruined. This is normal. Our body has a repair system for that. What’s not normal is sitting for like 8-10 hours a day in one position without moving. Okay, that’s wear and tear on your body. Now we’re really creating a lot of cleanup work. And a lot of us have been doing that for decades because we had to for our jobs. So then also we are whatever age we are now, and we’ve had a lifetime of maybe not having the best foods. That’s fine. It’s real, but you don’t need to feel guilty about it. It just is. And so that also creates… A lot of those pro-inflammatory foods are creating inflammation not just in the digestive tract, although we’re going to get to that in a minute, but also in the blood vessels themselves. And so that’s another area where we have inflammation in the vasculature.

(33:17):
And then a third one that’s just a bonus for our time and place is COVID. We’ve all had it. And COVID specifically damages the interior walls of the blood vessels. So, when we experience COVID, the acute infection, we experience it in the lungs or as a respiratory kind of illness because that is an entry point. But that’s not where the impact is. That’s just the initial battleground. The real impact is that it creates inflammation in the linings of the blood vessels, also the linings of certain organs as well. And so this is like three big causes of inflammation throughout your entire blood vessel system that by the time you’re 50 or 52 or 50-whatever age we are here in our perimenopause, 48, whatever, 45, even maybe a little younger, sometimes it happens even younger. We’re all dealing with a lot of these things. So, the big key is what can we take that will help the body repair the damage in the blood vessels so that we don’t have to do so much work of both repairing and listening to the inflammatory siren going on and on and on. If we can get some herbs that can help us repair that damage, that’s work off of our to-do list, and that means rest.

(35:02):
All right. So two here that are easy to get your hands on. One is berries. It doesn’t have to be hawthorn. It can be hawthorn if you want it to be, but any berries will do the job: blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, blackberries. If you live in places with other berries like lingonberries or – I don’t know – I’m trying to think of other like gooseberries, whatever. If the berry is red or blue or purple, it will do this job. That’s really good because hawthorn berries are kind of expensive if you don’t have your own hawthorn tree. But blueberries, especially if you buy them frozen, are way more affordable. So, if you can get at least one cup of berries a day – frozen or fresh, doesn’t matter – that is going to really help you in this regard. Plus fiber, and that’s good for everyone. All right. And then another one here is garlic. And garlic in your food is completely legitimate, but we want to really put the garlic in there. If you’re going to do this with food, really, really put the garlic in there. Just decide that garlic breath is attractive and have it all the time. But you can also do a capsule of garlic. That’s totally fine.

(36:28):
All right. So inflammation in the cardiovascular system, in the blood vessels, basically that’s inflammation inside of tubes. Blood vessels are tubes that go all over your body and we’re dealing with that inflammation that’s inside them. Well, if we come back to the digestive system for a minute, that’s also tubes. And it’s very common to have a lot of inflammation in your digestive tubes. So here again, anything we can do to reduce that is going to help. So, we talked about changing food. We talked about managing the sugar sort of metabolically. But here I want to really think about the tube itself. Again, eating whatever it is we’ve been eating, all that goes into the tube and can create damage. COVID also damages the lining of the entire digestive tract the same way that it damages the lining of the blood vessels. So, if you’ve had it once, if you’ve had it six times, if you’ve had it however many times, each time it’s racking up damage in these linings. Don’t worry, we can fix it. But it’s just there’s so many ways that we can get damage, especially in the digestive tract because we eat however many times a day. And so we really do need to think about supporting that part.

Herbal Options: Vulneraries, Relaxants, & Carminatives

(37:55):
And so I’ve got herbs for you here. And this is going to be I have a list of herbs here, and I’m going to explain each one a little bit. This list is a formula, but you don’t need every herb. So, kind of listen to each one. And when one of them says oh, that sounds like something I need, then put that on your list. And if you only end up with four out of the however many I have in this list, then that’s fine. Or if the whole list, also good. But I just want to be clear that this is a mix and match formula. You don’t have to have every single thing on the list for it to be helpful. Okay. And also you might not have a need for everything on the list. Okay, here we go. So we’re going to start out with calendula and/or plantain. These are two herbs that are vulnerary. Vulnerary is an old word that just means it heals damage caused to thelial cells. So here we’re talking about the endothelium that is the lining of your digestive tract, also the lining of your blood vessels, et cetera. These two plants also will help heal damage to the epithelial cells, which is your skin. You just have skin on the inside of your digestive tract, and skin on the inside of your blood vessels, and skin on the inside of your bladder. And all through your body you actually have skin in there too. It’s a little different because it has a mucous membrane, but it’s still skin.

(39:36):
And so these two plants, calendula and plantain, are really good at healing damage in skin wherever you have it, but they do it in two different ways. And so if you can get your hands on both, it’s really cool to do that because then you get that broader spectrum of action. And if you only can get one of them, that’s also fine. And then I’m going to add here chamomile. Chamomile also has vulnerary action. It also has that healing action for any kind of wound, any kind of damage on the endothelial cells, also the epithelial cells. Chamomile also has relaxant action. And so if you are dealing with cramping, especially like lower digestive tract cramping. If you are dealing with also PMS cramping, which has nothing to do with inflammation in the digestive tract, but just as an aside also that. And if you are dealing with tension throughout the body, especially tension in the mind, but tension anywhere really. Chamomile helps relax the body.

(40:46):
But it needs to be strong. So, if you just have a chamomile teabag, and you dip it in, and then the tea is like lemony yellow, that’s not what I’m talking about. It has to be really dark so that it looks like black tea. It won’t look exactly like black tea, but it will look very close to that. So, we really want to get a bunch of chamomile in there and let it sit for a long time. And this blend, whatever herbs here that you take for this blend, we definitely want to let it steep for at least 20 or 30 minutes just to make sure that it is good and strong. So you’ll get that vulnerary action sooner, but that relaxant action to relax the cramping, and the tension, and the pain that’s caused by that tension, that comes with that longer steep. So, we really want to make sure to do that.

(41:40):
All right. Well, now we can add catnip. Catnip also has relaxant actions. It is antiemetic, which means if you feel nauseous or if you feel like a lot of heartburn coming up kinds of feelings, any of those upward movements, especially the not desirable upward movements out of the stomach, that is an area where catnip can really relax things down. So whether that is GERD, whether it is just reflux, whether it is heartburn, it’s kind of all the same, just different styles of the same problem. Or whether it’s outright nausea. Whether you deal with outright nausea because of stress, or tension, or whatever else, catnip is going to be a really good friend there. Really catnip is about pain in the upper digestive tract. Pain, discomfort in the upper digestive tract. Chamomile is more in the lower. Although because chamomile also has like a whole-body relaxant effect, you do kind of get more generalized action there. But catnip is really that upper effect. Catnip also has a relaxant action in the mind, especially if you are dealing with fear, or anger, or anxiousness that rises up out of the gut, then you will – bonus – get that calming action as well.

(43:18):
Okay. Let’s talk about some herbs that are carminative. Carminative means warming. And they are warming mostly because they are stimulating blood flow to the area. And this can be especially helpful if you are a person who holds a lot of tension in your belly, and you find it hard to digest food. No blood is getting to it. The more that we hold tension, the more that we’re like clamping things down, then blood can’t flow to wherever we’re tense. But if there’s no blood going to it, then kind of no work can get done. So, that is like one of the primary ways that these carminatives really help in that relaxing action. The first one I’m going to talk about here is ginger. Ginger is just plain hot anyway. When you put it on your tongue, it is just plain hot. But it has that circulatory stimulating action. It has that relaxant action. It also has an antiemetic action. So again, if you feel nauseous, ginger can be really helpful with that.

(44:33):
Ginger does not have that same action for like the heartburn, and reflux, and GERD. But for nausea and also lower tension and lower cramping, it’s really, really effective. Fennel is also warming, but it’s not warm. It’s not hot on your tongue. It’s warming by bringing that blood to the area. And fennel is also really helpful if there’s a lot of gas going on. It just can really make that whole situation a lot more comfortable. Also, it has relaxant actions. So again, if you’re holding tension, or if you’re feeling cramping in the guts, then fennel can be really helpful. Tulsi can be helpful here. It also has that carminative action of stimulating blood flow, plus you get the blood sugar benefits, plus you get the mood benefits. Plus it has a nice flavor. And if you were going to make this blend as it is, then adding tulsi in would be pleasant. It would taste nice. On the other hand, you could go in the other direction. You could put anything bitter in there. Now, some people really don’t like the taste of bitter things. And if that’s true, that’s totally cool. But if you don’t mind bitter flavors, actually bitter, anything that tastes bitter creates a feedback reaction in the body that stimulates digestion, efficient digestion, and makes sure that there is enough of all the different juices to do all the different jobs as the food moves through the digestive tract.

(46:18):
Okay. So any combination of those herbs, but especially make sure that you get a lot of those vulnerary herbs. Let that be at least one third, but even like a half or 40% of the formula. That is really going to help in terms of reducing the inflammation. So calendula, plantain, and chamomile, let those three be like at least 30, 40, even 50% of the formula. And then the rest can be however you want to mix it. Good. Okay. Well, there we go. Now we have reduced inflammation in the digestive tract, which has taken work off your internal to-do list.

Lymphatic Supporters

(47:04):
All right. There’s one more category here that I want to talk about, and that is lymphatic support. Lymphatic support creates instant inflammatory reduction because it is literally sweeping away the things that cause inflammation. Plus, when you get stagnant, that creates exhaustion. The more that things sit and stew, the more tired you get. So clearing stuff out, making sure all the fluids throughout your body are fresh all the time, prevents that exhaustion that comes from stagnation. Plus, if we are supporting the lymphatic system, we are automatically supporting the immune system because they are intertwined. You can’t separate the two. The immune system depends on the lymphatic system to function. So, any support that you give to the lymphatic, you are also giving to the immune. Plus, my favorite bonus here is that the more lymphatic support that you provide, the less puffiness throughout your body. And boy, perimenopause comes with a lot of puffiness, and it’s not awesome. So, anything to reduce that is fantastic. So, let’s have some herbs here. And here I’m going to list out the herbs in terms of their place in the body that they work best. And so if you’re always puffy in your legs, or if you have a lot of stagnation in your pelvic area, or in your trunk, or something like that, you can be like okay. Well, maybe I don’t have all the herbs on the list, but I know I really want that one.

(48:57):
All right. So, let’s start with self-heal. Self-heal is the all-over lymphatic support herb. From your brain to your toes, self-heal does it all. So, if you’re like I don’t know, I get some kind of puffy everywhere, get some self-heal. Okay, that sounds perfect, right? The one drawback is that sometimes it’s hard to find self-heal. And it is July, July 30th. And so it is actually the perfect time to buy some self-heal seeds. Because wherever you live, if you live in a place with a yard, or if you live in an apartment in the city, and all you have is some buckets, it doesn’t matter. This is the perfect time to start thinking about planting self-heal. The seeds really like to go through the fall and winter and then sprout the next year. And if you have only buckets, you can grow so much self-heal. And it flowers over and over. It’s a mint family plant. It doesn’t have a minty flavor, but it is in the family. And so it just makes more flowers all year round. So, it’s not easy to purchase. Sometimes it’s in stock and then stock up. But sometimes it’s out of stock. But the way to make sure that you will always have it is grow it. And it’s not hard once you get it going.

(50:22):
All right. So, then the next one is heather. Heather, wow, heather is a really important plant to me actually. On one hand, heather is stimulating lymphatic action, especially in the lower part of the body and the heart. So, if you have some cardiovascular stuff and some lymphatic stuff, especially if there’s like varicosities and whatever else. And that connection between the lymph and the heart is for you not a very strong part of your body. Then heather is a really great choice. I also find heather to be very helpful in terms of working with grief. Very, very soothing in working with grief. And I personally do not know a single person in menopause who is not managing some aspect of grief. Because I don’t think you can live for 52 years or whatever age you are at whatever stage of perimenopause you’re in. It’s a bunch of years, and I don’t think you can live that long without having some grief that you’ve got to manage. So, bonus there with the heather.

(51:38):
All right, red clover. It’s the flowers here not the leaves, the flowers. I mean, the flowers usually come with like one little leaf attached. That’s totally fine. But don’t just get a bag of just the leaves. Get the flowers because that’s where you’re really getting that lymphatic action. And red clover is for me, I always think of this as the trunk and the lower body. I know a lot of people kind of put red clover more in the all over category or even in the upper body category. And I can see reasons for categorizing it that way. But in my body I really find it to be super effective with lower body stagnation, lower body lymphatic support, and up into the trunk. It might be that I feel that so strongly because that is an aspect of red clover that I need. That is an aspect of lymphatic support that I need. But I also work with herbs specifically for lymphatic support in the head and in the upper body. And I just don’t usually feel that way about red clover. So, you can experiment with red clover, the flowers, and feel what you feel moving in your own body. But I want to be clear that I kind of have that in the lower body category. But you will see it in some books, or some other herbalists will feel like it’s a little bit more upper body. So, that’s kind of fun. It means you get to decide.

(53:21):
All right. Calendula here, which was in our digestive inflammation group. Calendula is really, really helpful for belly lymphatic movement. So, like if you’re dealing with a lot of bloating, almost all bloating is actually an immune response. That is lymphatic fluid. So, remember when you were a kid, remember last time you did puberty, and you felt sick. And so then somebody would feel your throat, the glands in your throat to see if they were swollen, the lymph nodes? And if they were swollen, then you got to stay home from school because that meant you were really sick, right? Okay. That’s what bloating is. That’s what bloating is. All the fluid, there are lymph nodes all around your intestines just twined all around them like beads. And when you are bloated, it’s because those lymph nodes are swelling because you’re having an inflammatory response to whatever you ate or whatever. So oh, does that put bloating in an entirely new light for you now? Yes, right? We need to take that seriously. But calendula is super helpful with that lymphatic movement.

(54:43):
Okay. And then I said herbs for lymphatic movement in the head and in the upper body. And for me that’s ground ivy and elderflower. One great perimenopause experience that I have to tell you I am thoroughly enjoying – I am not enjoying it at all – is a lot of puffiness in my eyes. I hate it. I hate it especially because I’m on camera all the time. And so now you can just look and be like oh yeah, Katja, you’re right. Your eyes are really puffy. I hate it. But when I’m consistent with ground ivy and/or elderflower, it gets so much better. And when I get busy, and I forget to take it, it gets worse. So, these are really, really helpful. They are also very helpful for me with a migraine or a headache. Again, because for me most of the time there’s a component of stagnation when I get a migraine or when I get a headache. And so if I can clear out that stagnation and get fresh stuff up into my brain, then that helps the headache go away. These two, ground ivy and elderflower, also really help when my mind gets stagnant. Whether that is like afternoon brain foggy kind of feeling. Or if it’s like emotional stagnation because I’m really stuck on a thing, and I’m not letting it go. These are really helpful there too. Anything you can do to bring freshness into your mind is going to move the needle emotionally as well as physiologically.

(56:22):
Okay. So there’s a pile of suggestions for you that don’t have anything to do with drinking more coffee, or ginseng, or rhodiola, or whatever else to give you more energy, blah, blah, blah, barf. You don’t have energy. You’re busy using that energy to remodel your body. And so let’s do something to take things off that renovation list so that at least you don’t have so much work to do. Yes, I want you to take a nap. I want magical cleaning fairies to show up at your house and also somebody to cover you at work so that you can spend the whole day sleeping. I want that for you. But I haven’t met those magical cleaning fairies yet. So until that happens then these are herbs that we can work with to try to reduce the internal workload so that we have more energy while we’re dealing with the renovations in our bodies that perimenopause is creating. So, this is the part of the podcast where Ryn would say take care of yourselves. Take care of each other. Drink some tea. And give yourself a little compassion and kindness because perimenopause is hard. And if you’re feeling tired, maybe what that really means is that somebody else needs to do the dishes tonight. Bye-bye.

We like to sign off our show by saying, “Take care of yourselves, take care of each other, and drink some tea.” It’s our favorite little motto and it’s a great reminder that herbalism and self-care go right alongside mutual aid!

In our episode 283: Vetting Your Herbalism Sources: Red Flags & Green Flags, we talked about how it isn’t actually bucking the system to ignore the FDA and FTC laws about “telling & selling”. Neither is it a cool rebellious act to turn away from scientific knowledge, modern medical technologies, or even conventional treatments. They each have their place, and herbalism isn’t an ‘alternative’ to them in the sense of a dichotomous choice – either herbs or science, either herbalism or medicine. We can fit together, and we get better results when we do.

But it’s certainly true that conventional medicine has problems, and that the system needs some bucking! A system reliant on consumerism – buying your way to better health – always leaves people out. A lot of people. They need help, and we can help them.

The best way to do that is a little surprising: take care of each other. Extend our circle of care outside ourselves, outside our family and housemates, and further out into the world. We are all here together, and we can all support one another. And since we’re all herbalists here, let’s do it with herbs!

Three ways to get started:

1. FREE Emergency Preparedness course – Concise and targeted lessons teach you how to prepare for emergencies ranging from hurricanes to wildfires to heatwaves. Learn to construct a modular, no-frills herbal first aid kit, food reserve, and go-bag (or shelter-in-place bag). Understand herbal wound care and all the steps to take for cuts and burns. Anticipate and prepare for the effects of climate disasters in your community, not only to help yourself, but to help others too.
2. SLIDING SCALE Herbal Community Care Toolkit – This 20-hour video course teaches you safe, inexpensive, and accessible herbs which can make a difference in the most common health concerns in our society today. High blood pressure, diabetes, edema, pain, poor sleep – there are herbs to support people facing all of these challenges and more. They don’t need to be expensive, exotic, or risky. They don’t need to be “maximum strength” or “100x concentrated”. Gentle, simple, safe herbs can help people you know and love.
3. SLIDING SCALE Accessible Herbalism course – We consider this essential training for clinical herbalists, but you don’t have to be one to want this information! Providing care to everyone is challenging, and involves a lot of creativity and skill to find the right resources and get them to the right people – and to do it all without burning out. To do it, we teach strategies to work around resource constraints, addressing the realities of time and energy involved in herbal work. We share our methods for finding funding, improving access to care, and building community support networks: mutual aid for herbalists and the communities they serve.

You can go deeper, of course! These are starting points to get you helpful and empowered as soon as possible, while keeping safety first. And don’t forget…

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All our offerings are self-paced online video courses. They all come with free access to twice-weekly live Q&A sessions with us, lifetime access to current & future course material, open discussion threads integrated in each lesson, an active student community, study guides, quizzes & capstone assignments, and more!

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Episode Transcript

Katja (00:14):
Hi, I’m Katja. And I’m here at Commonwealth Holistic Herbalism in Boston, Massachusetts. All right, I have a quick note for you today because a couple of weeks ago on the podcast when we were talking about how to know if you can trust an herbalist on the internet. And we were talking about those laws that say that we can’t use the word treat. We can’t say that we treat a disease. And I was saying about how those laws are actually really aligned with our work as herbalists. And so when people are talking about treating disease on the internet, then that’s a red flag to know maybe don’t trust that person. And that people complain about the laws. And the thing is that breaking them or whatever doesn’t make you a cool rebel bucking the system and blah, blah, blah. So okay, if you didn’t hear it yet, it’s about red flags and green flags so that you understand who you can trust on the internet.

(01:16):
That’s just the setup though, because the thing is that when I said all that, I meant to go back and say what do you do if you do want to be a cool rebel bucking the system? Because I’m all for that. The system is not awesome. Our current system relies on everyone being too busy to help one another. That way we buy more stuff, right, items of convenience, items of comfort instead of communities of support. And if we’re all too busy to help each other, then we’re also all too busy to really affect much change. So, all of that means the people who are making lots of money in the system as it is keep making lots of money. Okay. So that’s our system. And if you’re like but I want to be the cool rebel bucking that system, that is something that you can absolutely do as an herbalist. I highly recommend it. And so that’s what I want to talk to you about today. And really what this is going to come down to is taking care of each other. That’s how to be a cool rebel bucking the system. Let’s take care of each other. All right. So, let’s see. We’ll just do a super quick version of the reclaimer. I’m not a doctor. I’m an herbalist. And so this isn’t medical advice. But maybe it’ll give you something cool to think about and also be responsible. Okay, that’s good enough, right? All right.

Be A Cool Herbal Rebel

(02:57):
So, if you want to be a cool herbal rebel bucking the system by taking care of your community, we have some tools to help you do that. And you don’t have to do it alone. If the whole point here is that we’re going to be cool rebels by taking care of each other, then you can do this taking care of with other people. So, I want to go through some resources that we have available to you that you can get, but then also that you can share in your community or start a club and everybody work on it together. It doesn’t have to be a super formal club. It could be. You could schedule the community room at your local library and actually have a community group really working on this. That’s so legit. Or you could just get together with your neighbor and work on it. Get together with your friend group or whatever. But the key here is get together. And let’s get together on purpose for the purpose of taking care of each other. Intentionally build groups that hang out. Yeah, we’re going to have fun. But also we’re preparing support structures so that when we need them, they will be there for us.

The Emergency Preparedness Course

(04:20):
Okay, let me go through some of these resources for you. So, let me start off with free resources that you can just go and download right now. Maybe the very first one is the Emergency Preparedness course. That is a free mini course. It has all your first aid stuff. It has basic wound care. It has everything that you’ll need for a kit to evacuate. But also a kit to not evacuate, like to stay in place so that you have all the stuff you need to take care of your household and to take care of members of your community. It also has lists of the kinds of paperwork and other sorts of things that you would need to have with you. Especially if there was some kind of disaster that’s like a hurricane or a tornado, something that has destructive power. Wildfires, floods, okay, there’s lots of things with destructive power. Okay. And also it has how to make plans with your friends, or with your family, or with your community for if you have to do evacuations so that your group can stay together, all different stuff like that. It’s really easy. It’s all laid out simple. You can work through it with friends and make sure that everybody’s prepared. You don’t have to be a prepper to be a person who’s prepared for situations that are likely, right? Some kind of emergency situation is going to happen at some point in your life. That’s just very, very likely. So it’s good to be prepared.

The Herbal Community Care Toolkit

(05:54):
All right. So then there is the Herbal Community Care Toolkit. This is a course that’s available by donation or free. You can choose. And this is a course that we built kind of intentionally so that you could start a support club like this. Even if the people who you are hooking up with don’t really know much about health at all, this course is set up to get you started from absolute zero. It includes the most important health concerns – like 13 of the most important health concerns – and the safest, most accessible, least expensive, most effective herbs that are unlikely to have allergic reaction or drug interactions. So it’s like a really safe place to start if you’re a beginner. Or maybe you’re not a beginner, but the community that you’re going to work with is made up of beginners. It’s just a safe and supportive place to start. So, that is the Herbal Community Care Toolkit. All these links I’ll put in the show notes, don’t worry. And that one is either by donation or free, you decide.

The Accessible Herbalism Course

(07:08):
Okay. And then there is the Accessible Herbalism course, which is available on a sliding scale. And this is a course for people who either have some experience as an herbalist or are beginning to build experience as an herbalist, but you know for sure that you want to do work around accessibility. So, that might be affordability. That might be accessibility for people who have chronic illness, or disabilities, or limited mobility. You might be wanting to target accessibility for people just who are super, super busy. And so they’re always maxed out on energy and never getting enough rest. And so you want to be providing things that are accessible to people in that boat. So, there’s more different kinds of accessibility as well, but we go through how to build a practice. Whether that practice is your own clinical practice as a clinical herbalist. Or whether it is a community apothecary or a community mutual aid group that is including herbal support. It could be anywhere on that spectrum. But this just has a lot of resources about how do you get help? How do you get funding so that you’re not burning yourself out either because you’re trying to do all the work by yourself or because you’re trying to fund it by yourself. It has information about different models that you can set up so that you’re able to work in your community for the largest number of people and across multiple kinds of accessibility issues. Also included in there is ways to substitute herbs so that the herbs that you’re working with are effective but lower cost. And how to figure out how to do that effectively so that you’re not sacrificing on potency, but you are able to do work less expensively. All right. And lots of other really great stuff in there too.

The Mutual Aid Toolkit

(09:17):
All of these courses include the mutual aid toolkit, and that is a guide for starting up a mutual aid group in your community. Again, it doesn’t have to be formal, or official, or whatever. There’s lots of different ways to start up a group. But basically mutual aid just means I’m here for you, and you’re here for me. And we know we can depend on each other. Intentionally we are taking care of one another. And so it’s about just being prepared for the things that are necessary in your community. Whether that is you live in a place with a lot of wildfires, or whether it is that your own personal community has lots of kids who are really young. And so the kind of support that you need is how do we all juggle raising children and also doing all the other things that we need to do? That’s another kind of support, right? There are so many different kinds of support. So, I really want everybody to have a broad picture of the ways that we can be taking care of each other because there are so many ways. There are so many ways to be a cool herbal rebel.

(10:30):
All right. So, those are places where you can start, and they will keep you busy for a long time. There’s so much information in these resources. And then also today is July 29th, which means there are still two and a half, three days left in our 20% off sale for July. This is a semi-annual sale. We do this every year so that students can depend on this 20% off discount. It means that you don’t have to prove that you are disabled. You don’t have to prove that you have a financial need. You don’t have to prove anything. You can just depend that every six months there’s going to be 20% off for you. You don’t have to have any kind of documentation about it. You can just get the discount, budget your studies, and get the stuff that you need so that you have the skills and develop yourself as an herbalist so that you can take care of the folks in your community. All right. Well, this is the part of the podcast where Ryn would say take care of yourselves and take care of each other. But I think that this whole episode was about that. So, I think I’m just going to leave it with let’s get out there and be cool herbal rebels bucking the system by taking care of one another. Bye.

Do your friends ask you, “what’s a good herb for…” IBS, or PMS, or fibromyalgia, or whatever is bugging them? If you’ve ever struggled to answer such a request, you’re not alone. It’s not just about the difficulty of the pathology, though – it’s also about the complexity of the person, and the variability between people.

Everyone thinks they can ask “what’s a good herb for IBS” and that you should have the answer. (Oops, you might even be thinking about an answer right now!) The question to ask right alongside such a thought is this: is that answer appropriate for the person asking? Remember, every body is different!

As herbalists, we need a lot more information than just the name of the problem.

One of our favorite mottoes around here is: “people don’t take the names of herbs”. It means that you’re not giving a good answer if a person asks “what’s a good herb for migraines” and you respond “feverfew”. You’ve left out tons of important details: form, dose, timing, duration, formulation… the list goes on.

The other side of the equation would be “people don’t take herbs for the names of their symptoms”, or their discomforts, or their diagnoses. There are no “herbs for IBS” in the abstract, or in every individual case.

Examples make this point most clearly, so this week’s episode of the Holistic Herbalism Podcast is us talking through five different examples of people asking for help with health problems. We describe how we would break those problems down so that we can figure out what the right answer is for them, specifically – not for “someone”, generally.

What would we ask first to get a foothold on the issue? What would we observe, and ask the client to observe, as we work to figure out the information we need? How would we construct a protocol and a set of health experiments that will actually help them? Listen in to hear us talk through the process in several different cases.

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Episode Transcript

Katja (00:14):
Hi, I’m Katja. And I’m here at Commonwealth Holistic Herbalism in Boston, Massachusetts. Okay. Tell me if you have ever had this experience. Somebody comes up to you and says what’s a good herb for IBS? And they just think that you will tell them the magical answer that is going to make their IBS go away. Okay. Now, right now as I said that, are you thinking about herbs that you would recommend? You might be, because you might know some herbs that can be helpful for some people having some kinds of IBS. But here’s the thing. Is that answer appropriate for the person who’s asking the question? Every body is different. And that’s what makes being an herbalist actually, in my mind, I think it’s harder than being a doctor. Because we always are having to think not just of what’s going on for this person, but also what is the personalized situation that this person is existing in right now? And how does that impact what herbs I choose so that I can come up with an effective solution for this specific person in this specific moment. Which will not be the same solution that I would come up with for a different person in a different situation still having trouble with IBS, right?

(01:39):
Okay. So, if that problem has ever happened to you, then this is the episode you’ve been waiting for. Recently, Ryn and I were interviewed. And as part of that interview some people had submitted some really personal health issues, but they were formulated just like this. Just like what’s a good herb for IBS? And they were expecting that we would answer with the solution that was going to help them, which of course we could not do. But instead what we did was we used each one of those questions as a model to explain how do you answer. Ultimately you need an answer to the question, right? You can’t just be like oh sorry, that’s complicated, good luck, and walk away. You do ultimately need an answer to the question. Okay, so how do we get from that question is not specific enough to I now have everything I need and I’m ready to make a suggestion? That’s what this episode is about. That middle section of what questions do we ask? How are we going to break the problem down? How do we think about what’s important for this person that might be different than some other person? What is the specific situation here? What things do we need to take into consideration? All of that so that we can make a good recommendation.

(03:08):
So, before I launch into that, I have two things to tell you. The first is it is still July of 2026 as I am recording this. And if it is still July of 2026 as you are listening to this, then you can still use code CATNIP to get 20% off all of our courses and programs. Listen, if you have been listening to the podcast for any amount of time, basically I am telling you, you will love our courses. The best way to support the podcast is to enroll in our courses. And when you do that, you not only get tons and buckets of information. You also get direct access to us. You can hang out with us live twice a week and ask questions. You can write us as many questions as you want every single day as you’re working through the coursework. We answer them every night. You can hang out with us in the student community. And if you don’t know how to get the answer that you want, you can just straight out email us.

(04:11):
Okay. Well, you can email us anytime. It’s info@commonwealthherbs.com. We will answer you. But really I think now is the time. Now is the time to enroll. And now with code CATNIP you could do it for 20% off. So do that. If you’re not sure what course to enroll in… If you’re not sure what course to enroll in, but this episode is really fun for you, honestly, I would say you’re ready for the Community Herbalist program. Jump right in. This is your sign. This is your sign. So I will put the link for that below. But if you aren’t sure where you want to start, use that email address, info@commonwealthherbs.com. Tell me what you are interested in. Tell me if you have studied anywhere else before, and we’ll work together to find exactly what you need to continue your growth. Okay.

(05:11):
The other thing I need to say before we start this episode, before we launch into all of the answers that you’re waiting for is our reclaimer. So, here we go. Ryn and I are not doctors. We are herbalists and holistic health educators. The ideas discussed in this podcast do not constitute medical advice. No state or federal authority licenses herbalists in the United States, so these discussions are for educational purposes only. I want to remind you that good health does not mean the same thing for every person. Good health doesn’t actually exist as an objective standard. It’s influenced by your individual needs, your experiences, your goals, and lots of other factors. So, keep in mind that we are not at any time attempting to present a single, dogmatic, right way that everyone should adhere to because every body is different. So, the things that we’re talking about may or may not apply directly to you. But we hope that they will give you some good information to think about and some ideas to research and experiment with further.

(06:18):
Finding your way to better health is both your right and your own personal responsibility. Which does not mean that you are alone on the journey, and it does not mean that you are to blame for your current state of health. What it does mean is that the final decision when you are considering any course of action, whether it’s discussed on the internet or prescribed by a physician, it’s always your choice to make. And that means that it’s important for you to be presented with enough information to understand what your options are so that you can make an actual informed choice. So, whoever you are working with as a health practitioner, make sure that you advocate to get the information that you need so that you can make a good decision. All right. Well, having said all that, let’s launch into the interview.

The Problem With the Question: What Herb Can I Take For This Problem?

Ryn (07:07):
Now, there were a number of questions that came in that were essentially, what herb can I take for this problem? So, kind of like a personal health question. Or if it was turned in the direction of somebody else, what can I give this person for their health problem? And these are not ones that we’re going to answer directly. Not in the way that you might have been hoping. But don’t worry. We’ve got a reason for it.

Katja (07:30):
Yeah.

Ryn (07:30):
And we’re about to tell you.

Katja (07:31):
So, okay. Whenever you go on the internet, you’re going to find questions like this. What herb is good for edema? Or what is good for chronic constipation? Or how can I improve gallbladder symptoms? If you have ever been on the internet, you have seen these questions out there. And then you will see a lot of people offering answers to these questions. And often the answers are just like the name of an herb or the names of a few herbs with no further instructions, no context, just the names of the herbs. And because you can see this everywhere on the internet, it seems really normal. Like oh, this must be what I’m supposed to do to get some answers, right?

Ryn (08:20):
This is the way people answer questions. This is the kind of answer you need when you have a question like that.

Katja (08:26):
This is like if I want an answer, this must be the way to get the answer.

Ryn (08:30):
Yeah. Now this might be happening inside of you, even if it’s not at the most conscious, forward level of your thinking. And so what we’re trying to do here is not to say people are dumb. And they go and ask dumb questions, and then they give dumb answers. And then they dumbly think that they’re dumbly smart. That’s not what we’re trying to say here. We’re trying to become aware of a cognitive bias that almost all of us fall into. And that the only way to get out of is to work hard to train yourself to not fall into over and over again.

Katja (09:00):
Right.

Ryn (09:01):
Okay.

Katja (09:01):
And so also, if we recognize that the reason we think this is the way to get answers is because we see this everywhere, then we understand like oh, that’s why I think this is the way to do it. And why do we see it everywhere? Well, I think one of the reasons is because people need help, and they don’t know where to go to get help. So, they just go anywhere, anywhere I can ask a question to try to get some help. So, people who need help should get the help. And that’s going to be part of the answer here. But first I want to break down why this is a problem, and why asking a question like what herbs should I take for my gallbladder symptom is not going to get you what you need. And it might get you something that doesn’t help at all, which is disappointing, or that causes more problems, which is worse than disappointing. And then how to get real good answers to your questions so that you actually can get the help that you need.

(10:06):
So if somebody says how can I improve gallbladder symptoms? Your first thought as somebody who is studying herbalism might be oh, they should take liver-supporting herbs, and they should take bitters. And even right now as you’re listening to this, you might be like well yeah, that makes a lot of sense actually. So if you see that somewhere, if you see this question somewhere in a Facebook group or whatever, you might actually post. You might try to answer it, and you might say burdock and dandelion root. And in fact I am certain that if you go to whatever herbal Facebook group you belong to, which is hopefully zero, but it’s probably more than zero. If you go to any of them, you will find exactly this question with exactly this answer somewhere in that group.

Ryn (10:52):
Yeah.

Katja (10:53):
Okay, here’s the problem. You’re providing an answer without an understanding of what the symptoms actually are. So, how can you know that burdock and dandelion will actually do anything for this person? And even if they are the perfect herbs for that person, just the words burdock and dandelion root, that’s not enough information for the person to take action.

Ryn (11:18):
The words gallbladder symptoms aren’t enough for you to answer this question, right? Which ones? Which ones do you have? Are you having spasmodic pain? Are you having difficulty digesting fats? Do you know that there’s stones in there because that does rule out certain herbs you might want to recommend otherwise? We do not yet have the info that we need to proceed.

Katja (11:37):
Right. So, okay. We don’t have enough information. We say burdock and dandelion root. Well, should they get capsules? Should they take one a day? If they do, that won’t have the same effect as a decoction that they had three to four cups of a day. And if they make a tincture, that’ll have yet another different set of effects. And so even if burdock and dandelion root were the right herb for this person, even if you asked all the questions and whatever, that still isn’t enough information for them to actually take any action.

Ryn (12:06):
Right. We file this under the motto people do not consume the names of herbs. Naming an herb is one step, but naming a preparation method, a dose, a frequency, other considerations that go along with it, those are necessary steps. They have to come together. They have to come together.

We Need More Information: A Gallbladder Example

Katja (12:26):
Yeah. All right. So, in order to really answer this question, we need more information. We need to know what very specifically are the actual symptoms. And then once we have that, we need to give them very specific information about what we’re suggesting, why we’re suggesting it, what we think is going to happen, what they should expect as a result, and what they should watch for to say oops, this was the wrong direction. If we don’t do all of that, then we’re not serving the person who needs help. We can really never know if the first suggestion is going to work because every body is different. So, if we haven’t given them the information to evaluate for themselves that it is actually working in their body and not oops, causing some harm, but that we’re going in the right direction, then they aren’t going to be able to tell us if adjustments need to be made.

(13:31):
And so all of that is super important. And now you might be thinking yeah, I hear you on that second part. But the first part, what symptoms are they having? Well, they told you what symptoms they were having. They’re having gallbladder symptoms. Let me share a story with you. I had a client about 20 years ago who came in with exactly the same question. What’s good for gallbladder symptoms? She had just come from her primary care physician that morning, and she had experienced some pain the previous night. And her primary care physician said that she had to have her gallbladder removed because of that pain. Okay.

Ryn (14:10):
This is jumping to the knife. Yep. So, that’s your first warning.

Katja (14:15):
Yep. Okay. And like okay, we don’t know for sure that the practitioner jumped to the knife. No, we do actually. That is what happened.

Ryn (14:24):
We do in this case.

Katja (14:25):
In this particular case, okay. So my first question for this client was, tell me about the pain you experienced last night. And she said she was up all night with really bad gut cramping. And it scared her because it wouldn’t go away. And it was really severe. And it wasn’t until about three or four AM that it calmed down, and she was able to sleep. And she had never had pain like that before. Now the primary care physician, I asked, the primary care physician did not ask her anything about what she had eaten the previous night, but I did. She had been watching a football game with a bunch of friends, and she had eaten 20 peppermint patties and the big ones. She had had 20 of the big peppermint patties. She knew for certain that the number was 20 because we were all doing it. And mid-game they had to send somebody to the CVS on the corner to get more peppermint patties because they ran out. So, she knew for absolute certain the number that she had eaten. For dinner she had eaten a little bit of chicken and a little bit of broccoli before the game. She was in a rush, and she had eaten some leftovers. And she did not eat what she said was any of the junk that the other folks were eating, cheese curls and stuff like that. She had one beer, and otherwise she drank soda.

(15:50):
Now this person had a history of IBS, and we had been working together on that. And it was under control with diet. She had a strong sensitivity to dairy products that when we removed that, that took care of a lot of the IBS symptoms. Okay, peppermint patties have milk in them. So, 20 peppermint patties worth of milk, that absolutely would have been enough. I mean, even like one spoonful would have been enough to trigger her symptoms, and we knew that. But she had never had a symptom like this before. She’d had IBS, but this was totally different for her. The other thing about peppermint patties is that they have peppermint oil in them. And that’s not a problem in a reasonable quantity. But by the time you have 20 of the full-sizes peppermint patties, that’s enough peppermint oil that somebody could absolutely have cramping just being caused by the peppermint oil.

Ryn (16:46):
Yeah. You’ve got some tissues in the guts that are now excessively relaxed and others that are trying to compensate in some way. And so you get these like spasms and weird stuff going on.

Katja (16:54):
Yeah.

Ryn (16:55):
Yeah.

Katja (16:56):
Okay. Plus that’s a lot of sugar. So, 20 peppermint patties today have 520 grams of sugar in them, but shrinkflation is real. So, it probably was actually a somewhat higher number 20 years ago. But regardless, we’ll go with the today number. 520 grams of sugar in a three-to-four-hour period. That much sugar alone is probably enough just to cause vomiting and gut cramping as well. The World Health Organization guidelines for added sugar consumption for a whole day is 25 grams for an adult. Obviously most people have more than that, but 520 grams is drastically more than that plus.

Ryn (17:44):
It’s 20 times that much, and it’s in a compressed window of time. Yeah, that’s a lot.

Katja (17:49):
All right. So, my feeling in this situation was gee, I think the peppermint patties probably caused the gut cramping. That seemed logical to me based on all these factors. And since the gallbladder surgery wasn’t scheduled yet. And since she could be sure to ask her doctor to do a second evaluation before actually having the surgery, just to be sure that the surgery was actually necessary. Then my thinking was let’s give ourselves like a month and see if we can get things back to normal for her, get things back to baseline, get things stable. Now as an herbalist, it is not legal, neither is it good for me to say you should not have that surgery. That’s not my job. And also that would be practicing medicine without a license, not legal. But also I don’t want to do that because I don’t really know if she should have that surgery or not. But what I can do as an herbalist, legally and also appropriately, is to remind a client that they can ask for more testing or a second evaluation to double check before they take the action on a surgery, especially because the surgery wasn’t even scheduled yet. So, we talked a lot about that. We came up with a plan that she would have a nice, soothing gut heal tea, herbal tea blend. If I remember correctly, it was calendula, and chamomile, and fennel. She had worked with a blend…

Ryn (19:24):
Maybe some peppermint because we know she likes it.

Katja (19:26):
No, no, no, no. We hadn’t put peppermint in there. I know for certain because I was like…

Ryn (19:32):
Maybe we’ll leave that aside. We’ve had enough menthol for the next month.

Katja (19:35):
Right? But we had worked with a blend very similar to that previously when we were first getting the IBS symptoms under control. So, this was kind of like a return, a slightly modified version. And that she would eat really simple, whole foods. A lot of broth and sticking to things like chicken and rice and simple vegetables that were cooked for at least the first few weeks but hopefully a month. And also to stay strict on the avoidance of the foods that were triggers for her. Dairy was one of those. So, that seemed to work. The symptom never did return. And she felt stable, and things were under control again. When she saw the doctor again, which was six or eight weeks later, they did go ahead and schedule the gallbladder removal surgery. A month later she came back. She had had the surgery, and she said they biopsied it and actually came back and told her your gallbladder was fine. It was perfectly healthy. There were no stones and no signs of any problem. But now it was out, and you can’t put it back in. It’s out, right? Yeah. So, the point of this story is when you hear somebody say gallbladder symptoms, even if you are a medical doctor, you don’t know what they’re talking about until you ask. And if you don’t ask any further questions and just start giving answers at that point, you’re not going to give a good answer. Or if you’re the person who’s having gallbladder symptoms, and you just say that, and you are waiting for answers to come to you. They’re not going to be good, quality answers that will actually help you because people just don’t have enough information to get what you need for you.

Ryn (21:31):
Yeah. So, you do deserve some kind of an answer.

Katja (21:34):
Yeah.

How to Get An Answer: An RSV Example

Ryn (21:35):
Or such an answer is achievable. Maybe we put it separate from deserve, but there are ways to get answers to this kind of question. But posting on a Facebook group and getting a one-word response back isn’t going to do it. So, it can take some time. It can take some extra effort to figure out what’s going on there. But it is possible to go through that. And it’s also possible to do it without having an enormous outlay of money.

Katja (22:03):
Right. So, what you really need is a community herbalist or a clinical herbalist who is going to sit with you and talk to you about your body and your symptoms specifically and what you need and what will meet your goals. And you can do that. There are lots of places where you can do that for free and low cost. So, our school has Free Clinic every month on the first Wednesday of the month. And we also have low-cost Student Clinic sessions that are available seven days a week. So, there are also a few other schools that run free clinics and low-cost clinics as well. And some of them are online, some of them are in person. Ours is online. So, my point here is that if you are out there with a health problem, and you want to ask this kind of question. Instead of just putting it in a Facebook group or somewhere where you’re not going to get an answer that will actually be tailored to your body and your needs, go to a free clinic. We’ll put some links in for ours, and we’ll see if we can gather some other ones for you too. Go to a free clinic and get real help. Let somebody go through your symptoms with you. Let them hear you explain how this feels in your body and what’s really going on for you so that they can create a plan together with you that’s going to work for you and get you what you really need.

Ryn (23:33):
Yeah. Yeah. But we are going to do a few examples of some of these questions mainly to illustrate why we can’t give it a single word answer. And if you have this kind of question, or if you are one of the people who sent in some of these kinds of questions, this isn’t like to scold you but to explain why the internet at large can’t just answer it for you and to talk about some of the factors and some of the steps you’re going to go through to try to figure this out for yourself. And we hope that to be helpful to you if you’re studying herbalism and trying to become a community herbalist, a clinical herbalist, so you can see how this plays out. Yeah? All right. So the general theme though is going to be that these kinds of questions should generate more questions.

(24:15):
Yeah. That’s the necessary first step. So as an example, somebody wrote in and said hey, I’m trying to deal with brain fog that got worse following an infection with RSV. And I’d like some suggestions. So, brain fog associated with RSV, give me some herbs. Hang on, wait. First let’s ask was this RSV, or was it COVID? And not in a way of like I interrogate you. But oh, was that like you got a lab test result back on it. You were sure that this was the kind of virus you were dealing with. That can make a difference in what we’re going to do about it. Even if you were sure, I’m still curious about COVID because how many rounds of COVID have you had? And how strongly we know COVID infection and reinfection correlates with brain fog as well as a whole long list of other symptoms. So, I’m definitely going to want to know about your health history in that sense. But either way, we do have to get past the label – brain fog – and ask more about the manifestation of it. So, there’s a sort of classic brain fog that emotionally and mentally feels cold, and damp, and heavy, right, as if your mind is buried in mud. And so for that, maybe the first place to begin experimenting is going to be with warming and stimulating aromatics that have dispersive qualities to them. So, are you thinking about rosemary already? Are you thinking about sage and tulsi? Isn’t that a little trio we talked about a minute ago around getting things moving inside of your mind? Yeah.

(25:50):
So there’s that. But look, sometimes people call it brain fog when what they’re experiencing is more hot. And they’re distracted, and they’re unsettled, and they’re agitated. And in this case I don’t usually want to just cool down or sedate the mind, but I do want to find a way to let off that steam, that internal pressure. And so I’m looking there at relaxing, diaphoretic herbs like elderflower, lemon balm, maybe skullcap. Maybe peppermint even can make its way into there. Okay. But we’ve gone into pretty different directions in terms of what set of herbs we’re going to look at or start with based on not the name of the problem, but their description of what it feels like for them to cope with that.

Katja (26:34):
And then the actions that we’re trying to achieve. Those herbs were just examples. We could list 10 more herbs in either case, but we’re looking for those actions.

Ryn (26:44):
Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

Katja (26:46):
Okay. Wait though, because brain fog can be a symptom of lots of other things as well. Is this person having a reaction to food sensitivities? And the first thing they might say is well, I don’t have any food sensitivities. And that might have been true earlier in their life. But after a few rounds of COVID, after a round of RSV, after a car accident or any other stressful event in life, sometimes things that we used to get away with now cause inflammatory problems. And so it’s really important to do some investigating there. Because if we just went and started with herbs, but they were reacting to a food that was common in their diet. Then the herbs would never be able to keep up with the problem because the problem is constantly coming in. It’s not like that problem actually happened once because of a particular infection. Maybe, maybe the infection kicked off a sensitivity, but then that food is coming in every single day creating new problems. Or maybe that RSV infection never was actually, maybe it was a red herring. Maybe it was never actually involved. We don’t really know till we just ask.

Ryn (28:04):
Right, right. Absolutely. Yeah. Okay. And look, sometimes the issue is that you’re having a symptom, and it’s triggered by a food sensitivity or some other area about the fundamentals of your life and your habits. So, it could be that for this individual feeling brain fog symptoms, that the poor sleep they’re getting is the biggest factor. And that’s a case where it might feel counterintuitive if you just look at the name of the problem and then the herbs you end up recommending. Because they’re like my brain is sluggish and slow, and you end up recommending wild lettuce, and skullcap, and passionflower. And it’s like well, that doesn’t make sense unless you know that the poor sleep is the major reason for the brain fog. If we can improve the sleep, you can wake up, and you can think more clearly for the whole day. So, now my sleep herbs are my brain fog herbs. And it only makes sense when you see the connection and you can tell the story.

Katja (29:02):
It could also be that when we’ve talked to this person we find out that the brain fog really isn’t as much of a problem in the mornings. It starts maybe around a 10 o’clock in the morning, maybe 11, and then goes throughout the rest of the day. Well, the more that we talk to them, we find out that they work in an office with really poor circulation, and that the carbon dioxide levels in there are really high. And then we say okay, well, you know what? Let’s test that. And we get a carbon dioxide monitor, which they’re easy to find and not even expensive these days, and take it to work. And holy cow, the carbon dioxide in the space where she works is like over 1500. And yeah, of course that’s going to cause brain fog. And then by the end of the day you get home. Okay, well maybe you have better circulation in your house, but you’re tired now because you’ve been tired all day. Those levels of carbon dioxide are really common. And they are enough to create similar impairment to a DUI, like the level of alcohol that would create a DUI. And so it might be like there’s nothing actually wrong with you. The problem is with the office. And so what we need to do is get an HVAC contractor in there, or get permission to open the window, or whatever.

(30:23):
And so just if we aren’t looking into all the different parts of their life and finding all the different causes that could be of course overlapping, right? Maybe what if it’s more than one of these different things or other things that we didn’t bring up yet. If we don’t find those things, then we’re just going to be like oh, bacopa will fix the problem because it’s trendy, and everybody loves it right now for brain fog. But it’s not going to help this person at all. They’re going to go away and be like well, herbs don’t work. I tried it. They don’t work. I think herbs are a hoax. Herbs are whatever. And also they’re not going to think much of you because that person isn’t good at this. They couldn’t help me. So all the way around, we want to get the person what they need, and we need to ask the questions to do that.

An Idiopathic Edema Example

Ryn (31:14):
Yeah. Let’s take another example. So, somebody wrote in and they were asking about what herbs would be helpful for idiopathic edema and talking about like what do you do when you’re all swollen up like a blimp? So, there’s a lot really even just in that amount of what they gave to us. So idiopathic as a medical term, what it really means is we don’t know. They can’t figure out what the cause is, but that matters here because edema has a list of common causes. And so if you’ve been to the doctors, and they ended up calling it idiopathic edema, that probably means, we do have to check, but it probably means that they’ve ruled out some of the most common reasons for it, like imbalance in your electrolyte intake, or the amount of salt that your body’s holding onto versus getting rid of, poor circulation overall, sluggish function of the kidneys and their filtration rate and so on. So, there are things that can be assessed and analyzed. And if that’s been done, then that also has some consequences for us as herbalists and the ways that we might want to leap to a response when we just hear edema. Oh yeah, we’ll get you some diuretics right away.

Katja (32:27):
And the thing is that really kind of think about what that means. The doctors don’t know. And without asking any further questions, we’re just going to give you an answer? But they’ve done testing, and they can’t figure it out. Okay, come on. We’re going to need to ask some questions. Now listen, just because something can’t be or hasn’t yet been explained by the person’s doctor does not mean that we can’t figure it out with them.

Ryn (32:56):
It doesn’t mean that they got a thorough investigation.

Katja (32:58):
Right.

Ryn (32:58):
It could have been well, we usually run this one lab test, and we ran it, and it’s not the normal result for this. So, something strange is happening here. I’ve got to go to the next one.

Katja (33:06):
Right, right, right. And sometimes it’s true. Sometimes people get diagnoses that are just wrong. And I don’t want to be poo pooing on doctors or anything else. But I do want to say that they only have a short period of time with their patients. We have a long period of time with our clients. And so a lot of times the discussions that we can have with clients are not really available to the doctor. And so we can get information that helps us see a pattern or see where this is originating, where a doctor might not simply have the time to do that. And then after that discussion, one of the outcomes might be we should take these thoughts to your doctor and say hey, these are some things that we think you should know. Does this change your opinion about what’s going on? Or some of the thoughts might be oh, now I see some herbs that could be really helpful or some other actions that could be really helpful.

Ryn (34:10):
Yeah. Yeah. Another layer here though is just the name idiopathic edema doesn’t tell us where in the body is this extra fluid stuck, right? Because that matters for us. Is it all over the entire body everywhere? Is it just down in your legs? Is it just in one joint, like one knee that you injured 10 years ago? Is it in one arm, or in the torso of the body, or whatever mixture it is? But each of these could have a different answer for us. If the edema is just in the torso around the belly even, well, maybe that’s just a response to some food that you’re eating. And we’re going to need to figure out some food sensitivities, and that’s going to be the thing that’s going to change the fluid retention for you. Or maybe they have edema in the legs, but it’s really only in one leg and not the other one. We’re like well, how did that happen?

Katja (35:06):
I mean, sometimes that happens. That’s not necessarily uncommon, but we still need to figure out why that happens. And one possibility, which is sort of laughable if you said this to a doctor, but is absolutely real. If somebody sits at their desk with their legs crossed the same way all day, every day, you’re going to damage the vasculature in that leg differently than in the other leg. And so over time that absolutely is going to have an impact. And even though that is a ridiculous example. Seriously, you’re probably out there thinking Katja, that is really silly. You might be. But all the herbs in the world are not going to help this person until we realize oh, we need to get you a different chair, or we need to get you standing up through the day, or we need to just not cross your legs or something. Because the problem is still happening. So, I think it’s important. This a place where a ridiculous answer like that really is plausible. And if you’re just like no, I’m just going with this medical word, and I’m just going to work with that. And you kind of rule out the reality that actually it could even be something silly. Which I mean, it’s silly when you say it, but it’s not silly to that person because it’s causing them pain and discomfort. Right, right, right.

Ryn (36:28):
All right. So, we’re going to get enough details to provide an actual answer. It’s going to take a little extra work, especially in a case where it seems to have already been figured out or put into that box of you’re never going to figure out why that’s happening. There’s still work for us to do. Another common element when we encounter a question like this is the necessary involvement of non-herbal interventions. So, for idiopathic edema we might hear about it. We might ask some questions and be thinking herbal actions, right? Lymphatics, diuretics, stir up the fluids, drain away the excess, cool. But it’s not actually time to think about the herbs yet. Because the different herbs work differently for one thing. If somebody’s having edema up in the chest after a mastectomy, the herbs, the preparation methods that I’m going to suggest there are going to be different from somebody with edema down in the legs coming from 12 hours of sitting at work all day every day seven days a week. They’re always there.

Katja (37:30):
Or coming from a cardiovascular problem or a kidney problem. Or coming from complications of diabetes, which is going to include cardiovascular problems or kidney problems. Even just with that one, just in the legs, there can be multiple different. Yeah. And then even if we think about the mastectomy, even before we think about which herbs we have to be like okay, well what stage are we in post-mastectomy? And is it even safe to be working with herbs yet? And has everything healed from the surgery enough that we can handle a stimulation inflow, right?

Ryn (38:04):
Right. And yet alongside all of that, maybe even more important than this, is going to be physical movement. Your muscles move the fluids through most of your body. If the muscles aren’t moving, the fluids aren’t going to go anywhere. And so if this person can walk, then that’s where we’re going to start. And we don’t look at this as like oh yeah, well, the herbs are really going to fix your problem, but walking would be good. It’s closer to the reverse than that. The walking, the physical movement, the movement changes in your habits. Because this is going to include don’t be sitting in one position for eight hours at a time or standing in one position for eight hours a time if you work at a counter. We’re going to want to build in movement breaks. We can be specific about things to do during your movement breaks to get movement in the particular spots where things are most stuck. A lot of times it happens that people who are really interested in herbs will try to do things with herbs alone that really do require or are magnificently enhanced by additional interventions around food, movement, sleep, stress mitigation, and sometimes community connection as well. And when those aspects aren’t addressed, then the herbs can only do so much for you.

Katja (39:25):
I think edema is such a really great example of that when we think about just pulling out movement. I mean, I could say this about sleep or any of the other stuff too, but we’re just going to pull movement for a minute. The lymphatic system has no pump. Like your circulatory system has a pump. And okay, your heart is not responsible for getting blood down to your toes. Your muscles help with that job. Okay. But still there is still a pump, but your lymphatic system has no pump. The only way for lymphatic fluid to move is from muscular contraction. So, if this person can’t walk, that’s okay. We can still work those muscles in some other way by some other kind of movement, but some kind of movement is going to be required. Otherwise, all the lymphatic stimulants in the world, anything that we give, or any diuretic, or anything else, we still can’t move the fluid unless we’re moving the muscles.

A Long-Term Constipation Example

Ryn (40:27):
They can’t do the job. The herbs and the holistic health habit interventions, they go together. They go together. Yeah. All right. Well, a similar example, right? So somebody wrote in and said, what herbs can I take for severe long-term constipation, and I can take them on a daily basis? All right. So, before we even think about herbs here, we’ve got some things to consider. And you can hit pause and be like well, what would I think of before herbs in that one?

Katja (40:52):
And I mean, you probably already have thought in your head of a specific herb that has already jumped to your head, and that you could be like oh, I’ll just say this. And so the immediate thing to do is when you hear an herb jumping into your mind, okay, we’re not going to just spit it out, like throw it out. We’re also not going to spit it out to the person. We’re going to set it aside. It might be useful later, so we’re not going to forget it. But we’re also not going to latch onto it because there’s other things to think about first.

Ryn (41:29):
Right. So, we’re going to ask about fluid intake. We’re going to ask about fiber intake. About what kind of fats and oils they eat, and how much, and how often. And we’re going to ask about movement habits. Because all of those things are really huge factors in healthy, and consistent, and repeatable bowel movements. Yeah.

Katja (41:50):
For that matter, we’re going to ask about diet in general. Because if their diet is 25% cheese, that poop is going nowhere.

Ryn (41:58):
That can be a huge factor for people.

Katja (42:01):
That’s a huge factor, right? I mean, cheese is delicious. But even if this person was like no, I don’t have a dairy sensitivity. I’m fine with it. Whoa, that much cheese is still going to be constipating. Yeah.

Ryn (42:15):
Okay. So, we start with those foundational habits. And then we can think about herbs, but we’re not going to leap to herbs before we do a few more assessments or investigations. So, constipation itself is generally some combination of tissue states in the intestines that are cold, and/or dry, and/or tense. And so warming, or moistening, or relaxant herbs are going to be helpful. And we can start with the ones that are most extreme. So for some people, their constipation is going to respond super well to ginger. Because it’s warming, and we’ve got a relaxant quality, and that just fits the need, and it does the job.

Katja (42:56):
That’s going to be a person who tends towards stagnation in other areas of their body as well. And also probably a person who runs cold and damp. Because that’s like a classic stagnant pattern. So, heating them up and adding in mobility, and in this case it’s circulatory mobility for the most part, but we’re also relaxing tension. And the tension can just come from trying to hold onto all that stagnant stuff. So, even if your body overall is lax, you still can have tension in just the intestines. So, all of that in that kind of person is going to be way more effective. That warming action is going to be way more effective than something that was just an outright laxative.

Ryn (43:45):
Right. But if you have somebody who’s constipated but super dry, then okay, increase the importance of more fluid intake for one thing. But also let’s get them a demulcent herb like marshmallow. If we just throw ginger at them, and especially if we just throw it in the form of something hot and dry like a tincture, then that may not help them very much. Yeah, ginger’s going to try to move things and try to release tension. But if there’s not enough lubrication, it’s still not going to go very far. And so the marshmallow could be way more important and effective for that individual. Some people might respond really well to good, strong chamomile. We’ve got a little bitter influence coming through. We’ve got a good relaxant action coming through in there. Maybe there’s also a nervous element of their constipation that the chamomile’s helping to address. And so that could be the most helpful herb for them. All right. And then we can also admit that yeah, there’s always yellow dock, or there’s always coffee.

Katja (44:47):
Two herbs that probably jumped right to your mind.

Ryn (44:50):
And those will give you a bowel movement. But we recognize in that that they’re not going to fix the root of the problem if those foundational elements aren’t addressed, and if we don’t ever consider constitution, and we don’t ever consider their diets, and their movement habits, and so on.

Katja (45:08):
If you’re just traveling, and you are bound up because that happens when you travel. There’s no problem with just grabbing some yellow dock or some coffee and don’t make it so complicated. Just take some, and it’ll be fine. Especially if you already know that works for you. But this person’s talking about severe, long-term constipation. And yellow dock might simply not be enough. It might actually not touch it. I’ve known lots of people who have taken yellow dock and said yeah, that didn’t do anything for me. So if this is severe, long-term, chronic constipation, just grabbing some cascara sagrada is not a fantastic idea. Maybe sometimes as a one off in an emergency kind of super discomfort situation. But that very quickly turns into not a one off, you know?

Ryn (46:01):
Yeah. Too easy to slide down that way, right?

Katja (46:04):
Yeah, yeah.

Ryn (46:06):
But just kind of think back over the course of the answer that we gave here because we start with foundational interventions. Then we go on to energetic assessment of the tissue state in the particular area that’s got a problem. We think about how to match appropriate herbs to them. Or we see those as experiments that help us to verify and identify the tissue state that’s at play. You try the marshmallow, and it doesn’t really help. Okay, dryness wasn’t a big driver there after all. Fine. Information for us to move forward with. Okay. And then after that we can think of direct symptomatic or palliative kind of a remedy probably with a stronger acute-phase action to it. And we can be clear that this isn’t about fixing the underlying issue. This is about immediate relief. Yeah. Okay. You see the pattern there? I trust you. So, this just brings us right back to where we started however many hours ago that was with the themes about uncertainty and experimentation from the very first question. This is the process that we go through. This is the only way to really identify what helps, what’s going on, what we’re going to do about it, and what we’re going to try next. Until that’s accomplished we remain in the less helpful form of uncertainty. We need to do some experiments to test out our hypotheses, provide data, generate new ones, and we can go forward from there. And this applies to whatever kind of question we’ve got, including ones that there is no way to actually answer them straight.

A Response to Turmeric & Slippery Elm Examples

(47:34):
So, like one person wrote in and said every time I take turmeric, or even touch it, or apply it to somebody else I get bladder spasms. What’s going on? And I’m sure that they were hoping for us to be like oh, I see it all the time. It’s a specific thing. But I don’t have a straight answer for that. We do have some questions that might help you to figure it out. Including okay, you react really strongly to turmeric. Do you react that strongly to isolated curcumin? What would happen if we took a single chemical supplement version and tried that? I don’t know yet. I’m not sure. But it would be interesting to see. It would be one way to narrow down what you’re observing. Maybe a better way actually would be to look in the family and say have you had any reaction anywhere like that to ginger? Pretty similar to turmeric. Okay, it doesn’t contain curcuminoids. If that’s the difference, maybe those guys are the culprit. Or other members of the Zingiberaceae family, cardamom, galangal, the grains of paradise, korarima, any of these different members, do they also set off that reaction for you? It could be some kind of a family intolerance or allergy that you’ve got going on.

Katja (48:46):
It’s also worth asking about the bladder spasms themselves. Because what if it doesn’t have anything to do with turmeric? What if turmeric is like an innocent bystander who just happens to be there when this is happening? What other times does this person get bladder spasms? Could this person actually have interstitial cystitis or a chronic UTI? And they have made this association in their mind with the turmeric, but it’s actually not the right association. And so they’re suffering with this bladder problem that isn’t being dealt with because they’ve associated it with turmeric. Maybe not. Maybe turmeric really is the cause. But we don’t know until we get really curious and start asking all these different questions to figure out all the different possible sources of input that could be at play here.

Ryn (49:40):
Yeah. All right. And then for the person who wrote in asking if slippery elm was a good remedy for acid reflux. My question in response is what does a good remedy do? Because slippery elm will very reliably relieve the burning sensation when you have an active flare up of heartburn, right? And it will soothe irritated mucosa in your throat and in your stomach. And that’s good. That’s good. It’s palliative. But if you’re looking for something that will quote-unquote cure your acid reflux, then slippery elm may not accomplish that because your acid reflux could be due to a lot of pressure inside of your abdomen. And maybe that’s coming from dysbiosis that’s causing bloating in response to some of the food that you eat. Or maybe that’s coming because of your alignment and your posture in the chairs that you sit in that kind of cause you to crunch your belly inside, and that makes a lot of pressure in there. It wants to push up against your stomach and against the lower esophageal sphincter. And now that’s a big contributor to your heartburn. Slippery elm won’t change those habits, those food elements, those responses to the way that you sit and move. And so is it a good remedy? I’m not sure. You have to answer that, right? If your reflux is coming from stress, if it’s coming from a food intolerance, et cetera, et cetera. We need more information, and we need to do some experiments before we’re going to figure out if this is the right thing for you.

Katja (51:07):
And also we need to know what do you actually want? I think that’s a really important part of what does a good remedy do. What result are you looking for? And if you’re looking for oh, I don’t want to ever have to think about this again. Okay, well, no. But if you’re looking for this doesn’t happen very often. But every once in a while it happens, and I just need something to soothe it in that moment. Well, okay. Actually probably.

Ryn (51:34):
Yeah, for sure.

Katja (51:36):
All right. Well, that was all quite a ramble. You might be over there thinking come on, what’s the harm in just saying sure, slippery will probably be great. Or suggesting some lymphatic stimulants or whatever. Because hey, it’ll probably help anyway, right? It might.

Ryn (51:57):
It might. It might. Every herbalist has plenty of stories of I gave them the first herb that came to mind, and it really, really helped a lot. And then they were super thrilled. And that’s a nice day to have as a practitioner. But it won’t be every one of your days.

Katja (52:13):
No. And also that story doesn’t always have a happy ending. Sometimes that story has oops, and I made it way worse. And so then there’s the one in the middle. What if it does nothing? Well okay, now that person says I tried herbs, and they didn’t work, right?

Ryn (52:29):
Yeah.

Katja (52:31):
And that person now isn’t helped, isn’t served at all. So on one hand yes, herbalism is the people’s medicine. It is available to anyone. It certainly is way more accessible than many other types of options. But it doesn’t mean that we as herbalists don’t need training. We need a lot of training. And for the person on the other side of the table, right? They can’t just ask a question and get a pez dispenser answer that will just solve all the problems. There has to be a dialogue. There has to be a consultation with collaboration in order to find the thing that will actually help them. The thing that will help them is out there. The thing that will help them may be multiple things that we stack next to each other to get a cumulative improvement that we’re happy with. It may not be one thing. It might be multiple things. Actually, it’s almost always multiple things. But we’re not going to be able to figure that out without the discussion, without the conversation, without the uncertainty that builds curiosity, that helps us to come up with the right answer for this particular person in their own body that is different than everybody else’s body.

The Answer is Never Just the Name of An Herb

Ryn (53:51):
And that answer is not going to be the name of an herb. And so don’t accept that in a clinical context. Don’t accept that in a social media herbal discussion group context. It’s not a helpful answer anywhere. Be digging for the rest of the details, the rest of the protocol, the rest of the formula, the rest of the story.

Katja (54:13):
And really I think this is also a call to action for people to be seeking out their local community herbalists and clinical herbalists and seeking out those free options. If you are with budget constraints, there are free options. There are low-cost options. They are available. We have openings every single day. And so if you’re out there saying I can’t find one, we can hook you up. But I think that as an herbal community if we are recognizing that the simple answer I have this problem, what’s my answer? That that really doesn’t work for people. And especially a lot of people have had that experience already in the medical world, and it didn’t work for them. And now they’re coming to the herbal world. And if we just replicate that same experience, we’re not serving them. So, really that we as students and practitioners and people as seekers of assistance, if we are all pushing for more, for more – not the one-word answer, not the simple off the cuff answer, but really personalized, collaborative kind of care – then everybody is going to be better served, lifted up. It’s going to cause herbalists to seek skill development, to be constantly learning and constantly developing their craft, which is how you don’t be bored. And it’s good for everybody. Yay. Sorry. I realize that I sound like I have pom-poms going on here, but I also feel really strongly about it so…

Ryn (56:06):
So rah, rah, rah. Come on.

Katja (56:07):
Yeah. If you feel really strongly about it. If you’re over there with your pom poms, and you’re like yes Katja, I feel that way too. Then we belong together. And you should come and study with us because we would love that. Yeah.

Ryn (56:23):
So remember, you can find us at commonwealthherbs.com, and we have courses for you, whoever you are, whatever level you’re at. Whether you’re a brand-new beginner, and this is all kind of blowing your mind in six directions. Or you’re somebody who’s been at this for a while, and we’ve been blowing your mind in three directions you didn’t realize were there. Yep.

Katja (56:46):
Yes. So again, that is commonwealthherbs.com. And you are welcome to email us anytime. You’ll find our email address there. It’s info@commonwealthherbs.com. Ask us anything. We are happy to help. We’ve got free courses. We’ve got low-cost courses. We’ve got Free clinic. We’ve got low-cost clinic. We have a million ways for you to get in touch with us and see if we have something that you want. So, please do. All right. Well, I hope that you enjoyed that. I hope that it was helpful for you. I hope that as you were listening to it, you were thinking about different friends, and family members, and people in your community who have health issues and starting to break those down. I really want you to be able to take these examples and use them as a template for yourself as you are working through problems for yourself, for your family, for your friends. Okay. Well, don’t forget that the sale code is CATNIP. It’s on until the end of July. It gives you 20% off anything and everything you could want. It’s unlimited. Use it as often as you want. Share it with your friends. Yes. And then this is the point in the podcast where Ryn would say take care of yourselves. Take care of each other. Drink some tea. And use the code CATNIP to get 20% off your entire herbal education. Bye-bye.

Today’s episode is about hibiscus energetics – a quick clarification on plant species & parts, and how herbal energetics & actions may differ among them.

The hibiscus you find most often in stores or shops or herbal drinks is Hibiscus sabdariffa, and it’s the specific part of the flower called the calyx.

The calyx of Hibiscus sabdariffa is distinct from those of other species in the genus. From this species, this part is fleshy, red, and sour. These characteristics are signals to us. The red comes from anthocyanins, and indicates antioxidant/anti-inflammatory and blood-vessel-stabilizing actions; the sour means draining to excess fluid, and cooling to excess heat. Energetically, then, it’s cooling, drying, tonifying.

This is also the part with greater evidence for impacts on reducing cholesterol levels, triglycerides, and blood pressure. There is some evidence that hibiscus can lower blood sugar, as well. This part has an interaction with the antimalarial drug chloroquine – but this is also true of lemonade and other acidic drinks, not a uniquely hibiscus problem. Almost all discussion of and research about hibiscus revolves around H. sabdariffa calyx.

Other species of Hibiscus don’t produce that fleshy calyx. The leaves and flower petals of H. sabdariffa itself, and the leaves and flowers of other Hibiscus species (e.g. the rose of Sharon, H. syriacus and rose mallow, H. rosa-sinensis), are more similar to the herb marshmallow & other members of the mallow family. They are cooling, moistening, and relaxant, with a mucilaginous quality. They can help with dry coughs, sore throats, dehydration, and similar dry conditions.

So to review: all parts of all species are cooling. Leaf & flower are moistening & relaxant. H. sabdariffa calyx is drying & tonifying. You can compare the H.sab calyx to rose hips, and the leaves & flowers to marshmallow.

It’s important to keep this distinction in mind whenever discussing “hibiscus”!

All this illustrates a fundamental truth of herbalism, very clearly: plant species, part of plant, and other specific details about an herb can make a big difference in how we work with it, and what it can accomplish. So, don’t let these details slip past you! They could make the difference between a remedy that does the job, and one that lets you down.

For further info on hibiscus:

• HHP 191: Herbs A-Z: Hibiscus & Hypericum
• images of Hibiscus sabdariffa calyx at IPlantz
• Hibiscus profile at Herbal Reality

And for more high-quality education about herbs, with all the necessary details and nuances: learn with us!

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Episode Transcript

Ryn (00:15):
Hi, I’m Ryn. And I’m here at Commonwealth Holistic Herbalism in Boston, Massachusetts and on the internet everywhere, thanks to the power of the podcast. All right, today’s is going to be a quick episode. This is a clarification on plant species and parts, specifically focusing on the herb hibiscus and a couple relatives. And looking at the ways that energetics and actions can differ among them, sometimes in important ways and certainly in relevant ways to our work as herbalists. But first, just a quick reminder that our sale is on for the whole month of July. Everything’s included, every course, every program, all the stuff that we’ve got, all 20% off. So listen, before you go out to see the new Spider-Man movie, get yourself some herbal education. 20% off, use the code CATNIP at checkout, and that’s all you need to know. So, let me also give an abbreviated version of our reclaimer for the podcast, which is where we just remind you that we’re not doctors. We’re herbalists and holistic health educators. That the ideas in this podcast do not constitute medical advice. They’re for educational purposes only because everyone’s body is different. And remember that the final decision about whether to try something or pursue a course of action is always yours alone.

Hibiscus sabdariffa & Its Unique Calyx

(01:32):
Okay, so let’s talk about hibiscus. The hibiscus that you find in stores, or in shops, or online, or in herbal drinks is almost always, almost 100% of the time guaranteed to be the specific species Hibiscus sabdariffa. So genus Hibiscus, species sabdariffa. And from that species it’s the part of the plant called the calyx. What is a calyx? A calyx is the term for all of the sepals together. You may be thinking back to any botany you’ve ever learned. And okay, we’ve got a flower. It’s got petals, and then it has sepals. Sepals are modified leaves that occur on the outermost whirl or the outermost edge of the flowering part of the plant. They’re like leaves because usually they have a broad base to them. They have green coloration in most cases but not with Hibiscus sabdariffa, as we’ll see in a moment. And they are often a little different from the other leaves on the plant. They might be waxy or tough. And sometimes they fall off, and sometimes they stick to the flower as it develops and as it forms a seed and a fruit around there. And in the case of hibiscus in particular, they develop into what’s called an accessory fruit. And that means a fruit that has developed out of more parts of the flower or more parts of the plant than just the ovary, which is where the seeds themselves form.

(03:10):
So in the case of hibiscus, we have the entire calyx, all of the sepals together. We’ve got the flower, we’ve got the parts in the middle that stick out, the reproductive bits. We’ve got the flower petals on Hibiscus sabdariffa. They’re red, and a little fluffy looking, and soft. And then under that we have the calyx. These are these modified leaves, a special part of the plant. In Hibiscus sabdariffa in particular, the calyx is distinct from other species in that same genus. So you’ve got other varieties, well not varieties but species of hibiscus that are similar in a lot of ways, similar overall flower shape, but their calyx isn’t the same. In Hibiscus sabdariffa, that calyx, it becomes fleshy, and red, and sour as it develops. And those characteristics of that are signals to us as herbalists. The redness is a color, and colors come from pigments. And in this case we know that they come from anthocyanins, which are a really well-known group of pigment compounds that occur in a lot of plants that have red, blue, and purple coloration to them. And they convey these antioxidant effects, these anti-inflammatory actions, even capacity to stabilize and improve the integrity of blood vessels. Particularly in the tiniest blood vessels, which can be relevant for things like eye health. Because a lot of eye problems develop when the tiny little capillaries that feed the nerves in the eye start to break down or have struggles, inflammation problems developing. And so we can look at some particulars like eye health, but we can also look more broadly and say hey, this is going to help to bring down inflammation. This is going to help to stabilize these important tissues that are involved in the delivery of blood, and nutrients, and oxygen to all the other tissues in the body. So the effects can be far reaching and profound. But we can know almost all of that from just the color. The fact that we have a really brightly, deeply pigmented plant part that we can work with there. We can expect those kind of activities, and we do receive them.

Energetics, Actions, & Cautions

(05:19):
Now, the flavor of that calyx from Hibiscus sabdariffa is sour. And sour is a signal to us as herbalists also. Sour means that we can expect a draining effect, a drying effect ultimately because of stirring up and eliminating excess fluids from the body. Sour herbs are also cooling. And so when someone is experiencing a lot of heat as part of their constitution, or as part of a symptom or a condition that they’re going through at the moment, or just because it’s a hot August day. Then we sort of instinctively reach for something sour, lemonade, limeade, something like that, or a nice, cool infusion of Hibiscus sabdariffa calyx. Because that specific part of the plant is sour and also red. And all these things also are indicators to us about the energetics of the plant. I’ve already used some energetic terminology in describing this, right? So, this part of this species is energetically cooling, and also drying, and also tonifying. All that sourness is coming from plant acids that are present in that plant and in that part of the plant especially, especially concentrated there. And so they contribute to a tonifying quality. Not dissimilar to the way that tannin content in plants does, but with a different kind of a degree and a different specificity to it.

(06:47):
So this, again, is the most common part of the plant and the most common specific species that people are looking at and talking about when they mention hibiscus as an herbal remedy. This is also the part and species that has greater evidence for impacts on things like bringing down cholesterol levels, especially LDL cholesterol levels. Bringing down triglycerides as well, which is a really beneficial effect for cardiovascular health and your lipid profile, as well as blood pressure. These are all associated specifically with Hibiscus sabdariffa calyx taken in tea or other methods as well. There’s even some evidence that this can lower blood sugar in addition, which is really beneficial in modern environments and modern populations. Now, this is also the part of the plant, if you go and you search on does hibiscus have any drug interactions, you’ll see a number of different options turn up, some connected to the beneficial effects that the plant has. Like if somebody is taking a drug to lower their blood sugar, maybe they should be a little thoughtful about working with hibiscus because it can also lower blood sugar. I’ll say that in reality usually that doesn’t cause something dangerous or problematic, but you will see that in the literature when you go searching. Similarly for effects on cholesterol levels, like combining habitual consumption of hibiscus infusions with a statin drug, you’re usually going to run across a caution like that. Again, I would say in the real world usually that kind of additive effect is more beneficial than problematic, but just to explain why you would see that.

(08:19):
The most common caution that’s raised though, and the one that’s of the greatest concern is actually with an antimalarial drug called chloroquine. And you’ll see that hibiscus infusions, or tea, or whatever can reduce the efficacy of that very important potentially lifesaving drug. So that’s serious, that’s real. But it’s also worth saying that this is true about lemonade, and it’s true about any acidic drink. Because anything acidic that’s taken together with that particular drug is going to inhibit its absorption and its activity in the body. So, it’s not like something super specific to hibiscus. It’s because, again, of those sour tasting plant acids that are super concentrated in the calyx of Hibiscus sabdariffa. So again, almost all discussions of hibiscus and research about hibiscus, even if it’s just stated in the general sense, is going to be about Hibiscus sabdariffa and its calyx.

Other Hibiscus Species & Their Energetics

(09:16):
But again, there are other species of this plant out there in the world. There’s a lot of them. And other species of hibiscus don’t produce that same kind of a calyx. They have a calyx, they have sepals. They have a whole group of them, and altogether we could say there is the calyx on that species. But they don’t develop into that thick, fleshy, red, sour structure that we get on Hibiscus sabdariffa. And so in this context it’s worth noting that the leaves and flowers of any hibiscus species, including sabdariffa but also including other species like the plant called rose of sharon, Hibiscus syriacus, or the plant called rose mallow, Hibiscus × rosa-sinensis, those are all much more similar to marshmallow and to other members of the mallow family, the Malvaceae. And by that I want to say that they are cooling, yes, but moistening and relaxant in nature. And they have mucilaginous qualities to them. And this is why you can see them being helpful for things like a dry cough, a sore irritated throat, for overall dehydration of the body, for difficulty maintaining good fluid balance and fluid retention, and for other conditions that we would categorize in our herbal energetics as dry or based on dryness. All right.

(10:41):
And it’s worth noting because many of those plants are pretty easy to grow at home. Hibiscus × rosa-sinensis, for instance, is a very easy plant to grow and to cultivate in a pretty broad range of ecosystems and environments. And it’s really handy to have a mucilaginous herb around when you need one. Of course in the modern world we can buy marshmallow root, and elm bark, and Irish moss seaweed, and other things that have those mucilaginous qualities, but it’s lovely to grow your own. And these plants grow large, large, tall plants with big flowers and large leaves. And so from a small amount of ground space, you can get a decent amount of plant material to work with.

(11:23):
All right. Now, just to review again, and just to really drive the point home here, all the parts of all the different species are cooling. They share that quality. The leaf and the flower from any of those species is going to be moistening and relaxant. If we get Hibiscus sabdariffa calyx though, that is going to be drying and tonifying. And so we could make some comparisons as ways to kind of group these with herbs that we’re familiar with and that we work with, just to give them a little affinity group of who they would hang out with best. And so in that regard, we would say that Hibiscus sabdariffa calyx is maybe most similar to rosehips. Another sour, drying, cooling, tonifying herb with a lot of anthocyanins, with a lot of antioxidant capacity, and those other kind of benefits are there as well. But the leaves and the flowers from Hibiscus sabdariffa, rosa-sinensis, syriacus, any other species, they’re more similar to marshmallow.

(12:21):
Okay. So it’s important to keep those distinctions in mind whenever we find ourselves discussing hibiscus or reading information about hibiscus. If it’s not otherwise specified, assume that they’re probably talking about sabdariffa calyx. If you see terms like anthocyanin, or sour, or red, then you know that that’s the specific part they’re talking about. The leaves and flowers, even if they were red tinted from those other plants or other species, they’re not going to turn the whole tea a deep, dark, beautiful red color the way that the calyx does. So, we can get some clarity about what we’re discussing just based on, again, those organoleptic signals, things that come in through your senses.

Plant Species & Parts Matter

(13:01):
All right. Now, if you’ve been a longtime listener of the podcast, you may have noticed that we’ve mentioned this before. For instance, in episode 191 when we were doing herbs A to Z, and we were doing Hibiscus there alongside Hypericum. I put a link in the show notes if you didn’t get to hear that one, but we go into a little more detail, a little more explanation about the ways that we can work with Hibiscus sabdariffa calyx as a remedy and the kind of benefits that we can expect from it. But I did want to just carve this out and give it its own presentation in this kind of brief format. In part because I want to have something that addresses this very directly and in great clarity so that I can send this over to people every time this issue comes to mind. Which is fairly often as people are students in our programs or working with us in other ways and are learning about this plant and getting interested in hibiscus more broadly.

(13:50):
But I also wanted to highlight this because it illustrates a fundamental truth about herbalism, a very basic facet about this kind of medicine, which is that plant species, the part of the plant we work with, and other specific details like that can make a big difference in how we work with that herb and what we can accomplish with it. So, don’t let those details slip past you. They could make the difference between a remedy that does the job and one that lets you down. All right. So I’ve got some links in the show notes here, including to our prior discussion of it on the pod. Also to a nice page from an organization called iPlantz, which focuses on tropical herbs that has some really nice images specifically of Hibiscus sabdariffa and the calyx formation, so that you can really see what I’m talking about there. And to a profile of hibiscus from the folks over at Herbal Reality where they talk about both this species and rosa-sinensis. And there are some points of differentiation that are called out between them there as well. All right.

(14:53):
And if you’re looking for some more high-quality education about herbs and herbalism with all those necessary details and nuances, then come and join us. Join us at online.commonwealthherbs.com. And don’t forget that everything is on sale for the whole month of July. All of our offerings, all of our self-paced online video courses and programs that compile them together into a whole thread of education and training for you, they’re all on sale. And they all come as always with free access to twice weekly live Q&A sessions with us, lifetime access to the current and any future course material we add later on. Lifetime access, never going to go away. No ticking timer on your educational countdown. You buy the course, you’ve got it. As long as there’s an internet, and we’re on it, you have access to it. Every course has a discussion thread on every single lesson. So, if you’ve got a question while you’re watching or reading, open it up, pop a question in there. Our faculty will get a response to you within 24 hours.

(15:52):
There’s also an active student community for discussions of your triumphs, your successes, your favorite formulae that you’ve come up with. All kinds of other fun discussions like that in our student community. And as you go along through your learning, we’ve got study guides, we’ve got capstone assignments, we’ve got quizzes. We’ve got all kinds of things to help you learn and help you to get it out of your head and into your life, and into your senses, and into your habits because that’s where the real learning is going to actually take place. So, use the code CATNIP at checkout for the whole month of July 2026, and you can get 20% off everything. All right, that’s it for today. Thank you for listening. Thank you for watching if you’re on YouTube. And we’ll be back soon with some more Holistic Herbalism podcast for you. Until then take care of yourselves. Take care of each other. Drink some tea. And make sure you know which part of the plant and which species it is that you’re actually consuming. All right, bye.

Herbal confidence takes some work to develop. The whole point of learning herbalism is to help people – but when you’re still a student, that’s a little bit tricky! You don’t always know the answer. It might be something you just didn’t learn about yet. Or maybe you know part of it, but you’re not confident about the whole story. Maybe the question was just really intimidating! So you feel hesitant and unsure about how to help.

As you learn more, your confidence will grow. It’s ok to wait – you don’t have to start giving out advice the moment you begin learning about herbs! That pressure isn’t helping you, and setting it aside is completely appropriate.

But the flip side is this: you do have to get some practice, right? Especially as you develop your knowledge beyond the basics. Otherwise it’s going to feel too hard forever. It needs to be real-world practice, too, not just theory. You need ways to put your skills to work, even as you’re in the process of developing them.

Fear not, friends: we’ve got solutions for this. Today’s episode of the Holistic Herbalism Podcast is all about a game you can play to get that practice in a way that is totally safe! It’s simple, free, and guaranteed to boost your confidence & capability for making accurate assessments and giving good advice.

Any questions? You can contact us anytime: info@commonwealthherbs.com is our email address, and the best way to reach us.

Interested in a clinical consultation with us? Find all of our clinic options right here. By the way, you don’t have to be a student with us to get a clinic session – it’s open to everyone!

Learn all about the 4 pillars and a holistic approach to herbalism with this free course: 4 Keys to Holistic Herbalism

Once you’re a student, you can get a Quick Help session at any time. Just grab any free course (or paid course!) and you’ll have access to free sessions with katja on Thursdays – the link is right on your student dashboard. Students also get access to our live Q&A sessions, our private student community, and more!

Everything’s on sale in July!

All our offerings are self-paced online video courses. They all come with free access to twice-weekly live Q&A sessions with us, lifetime access to current & future course material, open discussion threads integrated in each lesson, an active student community, study guides, quizzes & capstone assignments, and more!

Use code CATNIP at checkout to get 20% off!

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Our theme music is “Wings” by Nicolai Heidlas.

Episode Transcript

Katja (00:00:13):
Hi, I’m Katja. And I’m here at Commonwealth Holistic Herbalism in Boston, Massachusetts. I’m really excited because I have a game to share with you today that I think you’re going to like. So, let’s jump in. The whole point of learning herbalism, I mean, besides that plants are really cool, and it’s fun to be outside and okay, those are also part of the point. But the whole point of learning herbalism is to help people. That’s why we got into this, to help ourselves, to help our friends, our families, our communities. But the problem is that when you’re still a student, that’s a little tricky, and awkward, and kind of uncomfortable sometimes because you don’t always know the answer. And maybe you feel like well, I know part of it, I think, but I’m not confident about that part. Or maybe the question that they asked you was really intimidating. And you’re just like maybe I knew that stuff, but I’m kind of intimidated right now, and it all flew out of my head. It can be a lot of pressure when your friends expect you to be able to just solve their health problems because oh, you’re learning herbalism. Sometimes they ask easy things that you know about that you’ve already learned like oh, what’s something I can do for my heartburn? Okay, well, they don’t want you to fix the whole every single thing. They just want to feel better right now. And you can give them a cup of many different kinds of tea. You could give them catnip. You could give them marshmallow root. You could give them lots of different things, and it would help them feel better in that one moment, right? So, maybe you’re like oh, well that question wasn’t too hard. Fine, I can answer that. That’s great.

(00:01:53):
But then sometimes people ask questions, and they really don’t realize how complicated the question is and how much work goes into coming up with the solution. And you’re like I don’t know the answer to this. And I’m not even sure that I know all the parts that I need to know to get to the answer. And I don’t know how to explain to you without offending you that this is way outside my scope of practice, and what you’re asking is not actually simple. It’s actually really hard, but I don’t want to offend you. It’s very uncomfortable. But then the flip side of that is what if you’re wrong? What if you try to help somebody and you’re wrong? Okay, well that doesn’t feel good either. And then if you have a plan, whether it’s somewhere in the back of your mind. Or maybe it’s like your absolute goal, and it’s right in the front of your mind that you want to be a professional practitioner someday. That’s awesome. But if you make mistakes now, that can build a reputation that will hurt you later when you want to start a business. And so that puts you in a little bit of a bind too. Okay, now you can always say hey, I’m a student. I am still learning. I am not really to the point where I can answer these questions yet. So, I will tell you some things that I have learned. But I don’t know if it is the best thing for you. I don’t know if it is what will help you. Yes, you always can make a disclaimer like that. And I totally recommend it. Because if you know you’re going to start a business someday, people don’t mind if they see you developing your skills over time. But if you just make a mistake, and you didn’t give any kind of disclaimer. Then later when you want to do this professionally, they’ll be like yeah, but you weren’t good at this. That whole never get a second chance to make a first impression or whatever. Okay.

(00:03:57):
My point here is that, oh my goodness, your friend comes to you and is like hey, you’re learning herbalism. Do you have anything for fibromyalgia? And they’re thinking you’re just going to give them an herb. And you’re thinking oh my goodness, this is something we can work on, but it’s really complex. And I think I need a few hours to sit down and map out what I would say to you. And I’m going to need to ask you a lot of questions. And I’m not even sure if this is appropriate work for me to do yet. And ahhhh, right? Okay. The flip side of all that is at some point you have to get some practice. You can’t just stay locked up in this frozen place of oh no, I don’t know if it’s okay for me to help this person forever. At some point you have to take a risk. You have to at some point branch out and actually help people. So, how do you get from that place of like gee, I’m really not sure if it’s okay for me to even say this or if I’m right, to hey, I feel pretty confident about where my boundaries are and what I can do to help you. That’s why I made this game for you. Every time that you go through this little practice exercise game thing, it is developing your skills and building your confidence. But you’re doing it in a way that is super safe, and you don’t have to be afraid that you might hurt somebody, or that you’re taking a weird risk, or whatever. And it’s free, and you can do it anytime, anywhere, whenever. So, before I show you how to play I’ve got all the instructions here I’m going to talk about. And then I’m going to go through an example version of the game so that you see how to do it.

Reclaimers, Coupons, & Clinics

(00:05:44):
But before I do that, I have two things that I want to say. Oh, and also I should not forget to do our reclaimer because that part’s important too. So, let me start with that. The reclaimer is I am not a doctor. I am an herbalist and a holistic health educator. The ideas discussed in this podcast do not constitute medical advice. No state or federal authority licenses herbalist in the United States, so these discussions are for educational purposes only. I want to remind you that good health does not mean the same thing for everyone. Good health is not like some objective standard. It is influenced by your individual needs, your experiences, your goals. So, keep in mind that we are not trying to present some kind of dogmatic, one right way that everybody should be adhering to because every body is different. So, the things that we’re talking about might or might not apply directly to you. But I hope that they give you some new information to think about and some ideas to research and experiment with further. Okay. Today we’re talking about a game, and so it totally will apply for you, but anyway. Okay. So, the last part of this is finding your way to better health is both your right and your own personal responsibility, which does not mean that you’re alone on the journey. It does not mean that you are to blame for your current state of health. But it does mean that any course of action that you’re considering, whether it is prescribed by your physician or something that you heard on the internet, it’s your choice to make. You are the one in the driver’s seat, and don’t let anybody take that away from you. All right. So, that was the reclaimer. Did that.

(00:07:26):
Okay. Two other things that I just want to mention. One is if you are listening to this podcast when it comes out in July of 2026, then you are in luck. Or if it just happens that you’re listening to this podcast a year from now and it’s July of 2027 or something, also good. It is our semi-annual 20% off sale. This year’s July coupon code is CATNIP, C-A-T-N-I-P. It will take 20% off of all of our online courses, all of our online programs. If you choose a payment plan, it takes 20% off every single payment. And so now is the perfect time to gather up some more education so that you can continue building your skills and your confidence. And if you are not sure where to start, if you have a specific goal that you’re working on, or if you have some education already, and you’re not quite sure where your next step is. Just send me an email at info@commonwealthherbs.com, and I am so happy to talk with you and help you through figuring out whatever is the right step for you. Also, you can find our complete catalog of all of our courses and programs at online.commonwealthherbs.com. Okay. Check that off the list. I did it.

(00:08:48):
The second thing that I want to tell you, which is actually part of setting you up for the game. Okay. So, if friends are asking you for help, and it feels way outside your scope. You are just like no way. I’m not touching this one. I definitely don’t know the answer to this. Okay. Well, it still doesn’t feel great, right, because your friend needs help. So, I want you to know that you can always direct people to our Free Clinic and also to our low-cost Student Clinic. Our Free Clinic is once a month, the first Wednesday of the month. Student Clinic has sessions available seven days a week. So, it is super easy to schedule and get an appointment really fast. Those are $50, and the money goes to the student who’s doing the work. But all of the cases are overseen by faculty. So, when you have a student clinic session, you’re getting our most advanced Clinical Mentorship students. They have been through so much work with us to prepare them for that point. And you’re also getting our review on everything as well. So, you can totally just tell your friend wow, herbs can help with that. But I am not educated enough yet to do it. I’m still a student. I don’t really know the answers that you need. But here is a resource where you can get really solid help, and it’s really easy to do. The link that you can give them is commonwealtherbs.com/clinic. And that will give them the information about our Free Clinic, about our low-cost Student Clinic, and also a link to our Faculty Clinic if they want to do that as well. You can schedule appointments with our faculty also. But our student clinic is amazing, and it’s low cost and super easy. You do not have to be a student at our school to get a session in our Student Clinic, or in our Free Clinic, or in our Faculty Clinic. Anyone can sign up for these. So, as we’re moving through this, and we’re thinking about how to answer these questions, I want you to know right off the top that you already have a bailout plan. You can always direct people to our Student Clinic, our Free Clinic, and you will have helped the person who asked you a question. But you will not be feeling like just this pile of pressure on you that you have to do all the work by yourself. Okay. So, that’s a way that you can still help your friends, even if you’re uncomfortable with the questions.

Building Herbal Confidence: “I’m Still a Student”

(00:11:36):
But let’s get now to the game that’s going to help you build the confidence, right? Okay. So, your friend asks you a question. The question is I have chronic constipation. I have chronic diarrhea. I have chronic pain. I have whatever. And you’re like ooh, I don’t want to know about your poop. But whatever it is, whatever their problem is, if you feel like you know the answer, and you feel like no, no, this is something I actually feel solid about, then your plan is super simple. Give them what you think will help them. However, sandwich it between this statement. I am still a student, and I do not know for sure that this is the right answer. But what I’ve been learning makes me feel like this could help you. And so if you want to try it, I’ll tell you what I’ve been learning. Then tell them what you want, what you think would help them, and then finish it with the same sentence again. But listen, I’m still a student, and I’m not sure that this is right. So, we can try it, but I just want you to know that I’m not sure that this will actually help.

(00:12:55):
Doing that saves you on multiple levels. First of all, it engages them. It makes them have to realize internally oh wait, I have to bear some responsibility for this. This is not all on you. If it doesn’t work, I’m not going to come back to you and be like how come it didn’t work? You don’t know anything. No, no, no. You’re telling me that you’re not sure this is the answer. So, I better put on my responsibility hat. But also if it works, great. Great. And if it is the person has PMS, and you give them really strong chamomile, it probably is going to help them. And then they’re going to be like wow, you’re a really good student. You’re really learning this stuff, and it’ll feel great. But if it doesn’t help them, then they’re not going to say well, herbs don’t work. I tried it, and it didn’t work. They’re going to say yeah, I guess you’re still a student, and you just didn’t know the right answer. And that doesn’t even have to feel embarrassing because you already said to them I’m still a student. You’re the one who said it. So, if later they come to you and say that didn’t work. Well, you can’t be embarrassed. There’s nothing to be embarrassed about. You already told them you didn’t know if it was going to work. So, that totally sets both them and you up for a relationship where nobody has to feel like an imposter, and nobody has to feel embarrassed or any of those other things. And everybody’s on the same page. Hey, neither one of us is sure this is going to work. If you want to try it, I’m interested to hear what your results are. Okay.

(00:14:31):
But let’s say that you don’t feel comfortable answering it because you know they take a lot of pharmaceuticals, and you’re not sure about herb-drug interactions. Or because it’s just more complex than what you have studied so far. Or it’s about a topic that you just haven’t started learning yet. All those are so valid. So, whatever their problem is, listen to them. Let them talk about it. And then say hey, I don’t actually know that, but I can direct you to this really good clinic option that is low cost and all that stuff. Commonwealthherbs.com/clinic.

A Practice Game: Pick a Person & Write It All Down

(00:15:09):
Now, when you go home, or when you go back to your car, whenever you’re alone after you have seen this person, write it all down. Don’t write their name at the top of it because we’re anonymizing things. But write down everything they told you. All their symptoms, whatever information they gave you, write it down. And write down anything else you know about the situation. So, maybe you know that right now their work is really stressful, more stressful than it usually is, and they’re not sleeping very well. And also they’re not eating very well right now. Normally they don’t eat fast food, but right now they’re eating a lot of fast food because of what’s going on at work. And you didn’t ask them about that. You just know because you’re friends with them, and you know that that’s what’s going on. So, whatever that kind of thing is going on, write that down.

(00:16:06):
Write down whatever you have observed about their energetics. So, do they run hot? Do they run cold? Are they always dried out, or do they tend to retain water? Are they tense most of the time, or are they really chill all the time, whatever? And that is in their body and also in their emotions. You could be tense in your body and maybe a little less in your emotions. Usually tension goes in both. But you could be chilled out in your body, like very relaxed and sort of floppy in your body, but you could have tension in your mind. That’s true. But just write down any of that that you have observed about them. And then make some notes about their four pillar states. So, if you don’t know what I mean by four pillars, then grab the free course that’s called Four Keys to Holistic Herbalism. It is going to explain all this for you and it’s totally free. But let me do the short version here for you. You’re going to make some notes about their food, about their sleep, about their stress, and about their movement habits. So, not just right now they’re stressed out at work, and they’re eating a lot of fast food, but even like a little bit longer term. They’ve always had chronic insomnia. They’ve never been able to sleep well, even if that doesn’t seem like it has anything to do with what they asked about.

(00:17:47):
Or this person used to be a very active person, but now work is so busy that they have gone from walking a few miles a day to just being 100% sedentary. And it was like flipping a switch, whatever. If you’re just writing down the current moment, and everything is sedentary, that’s one thing that’s true. But having that extra information about their past and sort of what is their baseline is also really helpful if you know it. So, here you’re just making notes of what you know. If you don’t know everything, that’s okay. It’s not going to hurt the game. Anything that you don’t know, if it turns out later that we need it, we’re just going to make it up. And that’s going to be okay because this is just a game. Okay. So, now you have something you can work with. You don’t have total complete information about every single thing in the world, but you have a really good starting point.

(00:18:46):
Okay. And then the last thing is, if you know that they’re taking pharmaceuticals, write those down. If you don’t know the specific name… You know that they’re taking medication for depression, but you don’t know exactly what medication it is, that’s okay. You can just put the category of thing. Put whatever it is that you know. If you don’t know, or if you think they’re not taking any medications, okay, that’s fine. Just make a note of that. But if you want to make this the extra challenging version, you can make up a bunch of medications and just pretend like they’re taking them. You can just be like oh yeah, and this person’s totally taking blood thinners and also antipsychotics. Sure. So, that would make it more challenging. If you want the easier version of this game, then pretend like they’re taking no drugs at all, even if they are taking drugs. We’re not actually going to give this to them. This is for you, this is for the game. So, you can change the facts if you want to. So, if you want the easy version, and you know they’re taking pharmaceuticals, just pretend like they’re not. And if you want the medium version, then just write down what they’re really doing. And if you want the hard version, then increase the number of pharmaceuticals that they’re taking. Just add extra ones in there to make it harder.

Describe the Symptom Set

(00:20:10):
Okay. So, now we have a picture. We have what, like half a page or a page of information. It’s not totally complete, of course, but it is a really good picture of who we are working with. So, now the next step is you’re going to start thinking about what could you suggest to this person? And for this part of the game write everything down. Do not start censoring yourself. If you’re like well yeah, but they would never do that. Oh, this could help. Oh, they would never do that. No, no, no. Just write every single thing down you can think of. We’re going to sort through it later. For now, list everything, anything you can think of. And it’s great to be as detailed as possible. So, let’s think about how we can break this down so that you can get detail into your list. First of all we have to think about what is really going on for them. So, not just the name of the diagnosis that they have, because the diagnosis is not actually enough information for us to select herbs and strategies. That’s because every body is different, and different people have different expressions of whatever that diagnosis is. So, you could have five people with Crohn’s disease, and they might have five different symptom sets. There may be some overlap, but they’re not all going to be exactly the same. Plus, each one of them has a different body.

(00:21:50):
So, maybe one person with Crohn’s disease is kind of on the dehydrated side, and they’re really tense all the time, and they don’t really get very much sleep. And another person with Crohn’s disease runs cold all the time, retains a bunch of water, and they actually sleep more than eight hours a night. Our strategies for these two people will be very different. Even though both of them have Crohn’s disease, we will not recommend the same actions to both people because they have different bodies. And their expressions of Crohn’s will be different because they have different bodies. So, we need to figure out okay, it’s great to know the diagnosis if there is one. That’s fantastic. But then we have to break that down. What are they really experiencing? What is the list of symptoms that they are feeling every day? Is their version of Crohn’s that they’re getting diarrhea multiple times a day? Or is their version of Crohn’s actually on the constipated side of things? It could be either one. All right.

(00:23:02):
Now, this is just a game. So, it doesn’t matter if you don’t know the total specifics of every single symptom that they experience in the context of their health issue. If you don’t know anything. If all you know is that they told you a diagnosis name, fibromyalgia, but you don’t know anything else. Okay. Well, this is a great time to go research fibromyalgia. And if you have our Neurological & Emotional Health course where there’s a whole section on fibromyalgia, that starts off with here’s what fibromyalgia is like in different people in different ways. And here’s all the things you can do about it. And you also can just look up fibromyalgia and see okay, well, here are the symptom lists. Now every single person is not going to have every symptom on the list. And some people are going to have some symptoms that are not on the list at all. And that’s okay. So, if you don’t know the complete details that the real person that you have in mind is experiencing, you can make it up because it’s just a game.

(00:24:11):
So, put in as much detail as you can, make up the rest. And remember you don’t need an entire page of everything. If we just have like two or three sentences, if we have a list of like two to five symptoms to get working with. Because again, it’s just a game. This doesn’t have to be the 1000% accurate version. Okay. So, now we’re going to look at those symptoms, the actual experience that they’re having or the made-up experience that we gave them. And what we are looking for at this point is where can we get our hooks into this problem? Or like what is the on ramp for us to work as herbalists with what is going on for them? So, for a doctor they’re saying oh, here’s the diagnosis. I match that up with one of these three treatment options. And it’s like a multiple-choice test. Herbs don’t work that way. For us we need to kind of analyze what’s going on and then figure out where are the places that the herbs and various holistic strategies are going to be able to do work to make an impact for this person. All right. So, we’re going to look at those symptoms and we’re going to say well, do we see tension here? If we see some tension, we might need some relaxants. So, maybe an example of that would be they have gut cramping. That’s a form of tension. Okay. So, some relaxants. That’s a place where we could do some work. Or do we see stagnation and water retention? So, an example of that would be somebody who’s just chronically bloated all the time. Okay. Well, in that case, we might be thinking about some lymphatic stimulants.

(00:26:04):
So, there may be other areas where we really can’t move the needle for them, and that’s not a problem. We are looking for the places where we could fit ourselves into the work. When you’re beginning you may only see one or two places. And that is okay because if you can make an improvement in one or two places, you have helped that person. Even if it isn’t a 100% resolution, help is help. As you advance, if you’re an intermediate student or a more advanced student, you may see 10 different places. Worse, you may see 15 or 20 different places where you could get in there and make an impact. Okay, well, at some point we’re going to have to narrow that down because they don’t have time to do 10 or 15 or 20 different things. But that’s okay. It’s good to write them all down right now.

Break It Down & Identify What We Can Impact

(00:26:54):
Now it’s important as we are looking for our on-ramp here, it’s important that we have a super clear goal about exactly what impact we want to have. So, let’s assume this person, let’s make an example here, they have rheumatoid arthritis. A really good goal is I want to get the fluids moving so that we can clear out the metabolic waste that’s causing inflammation. And bring in fresh nutrients so that we can start to repair damage from the stagnating waste that has just been sitting around. That is the mechanism that we’re going to use. That is one of the mechanisms that we’re going to use to decrease their pain level. Because if we take away one of the causes of the pain, their pain will reduce. It might not be the only mechanism. There may be multiple mechanisms that we work with so that we reduce the pain. And each one has an impact, and then cumulatively we get a really noticeable change. But this is one goal that we have, and we’ve said it clearly.

(00:28:03):
That cumulative part is really important. We’re not looking for one total solution, which is good because there isn’t one. There’s never going to be one herb or one formula that solves an entire problem for somebody, especially if it’s something like rheumatoid arthritis. That problem is too big for one solution. So, I want to stop their rheumatoid arthritis pain. That’s not a good goal. We can’t actually do that because there’s no herb for that. But when we break down okay, well, one of the causes of the pain is all that stagnating fluid. And then another cause can be inflammation that is specifically because of damage from all that stagnation. And then another cause can be other damage that’s caused because these are all stemming from the stagnation, but that’s okay. Other damage that’s caused because the cells in the area have been starved. They haven’t been able to get fresh nutrients because there’s been a total fluid traffic jam going on.

(00:29:04):
Now those are three things, and the bottom two were consequences of the first one. But the first one, let’s clear out the fluids. That’s great, but then we can add on. So, clearing out the fluids is going to reduce the inflammation, is going to help bring in fresh nutrients, but then we also can do a little extra to help reduce the inflammation. And then we can do a little extra to bring in fresh nutrients. Maybe we change their diet so that they have more of the nutrients that they need to support this situation. Maybe we do some topical stuff, like some seaweed topically so that they’re getting nutrients right in the direct location that they are having the problem. So, it’s okay if as we are writing down the different aspects of the problem some of them are related to each other. That part’s not a problem. But the key here is that we are looking for how we can stack up all the different places where we can make an impact, where we can get our hooks in, so that we can add up to a big change for them.

(00:30:16):
All right. So, to come up with this, we’re looking at every possible question we can ask about their symptoms. Where is the pain coming from? What kind of pain is it? Is there only one kind of pain or are there multiple kinds of pain? Is the pain localized, or is the pain systemic, or is it both? How frequent is the pain? What are the triggers for the pain? And every question that you ask yourself is going to give you more information. But it might also revert you back to the beginning and be like oh, that makes me think of another thing for a previous question I already thought I answered, right?

(00:30:55):
All right. So, we’re just trying to brainstorm in as many directions as we can possibly go in. And as you’re doing this, just let your brain roam free. If you come up with a question, and you don’t have the answer, just leave a blank or circle it so you come back to it. Here’s what you don’t do. Do not tell yourself well, I’m not good at this because I don’t know this answer. No, you might know the answer 10 minutes from now. You might’ve just asked those questions out of order, but you didn’t know what the order was until later. The answers to the questions sometimes give you answers to the previous questions or make you think about things to the previous questions. So, that part is just really important as you’re going through this. You’re breaking everything down. This is a new way for most people to think about health problems.

(00:31:51):
Most people grew up in this culture. And so we just think about the name of the diagnosis, and maybe we think about a couple of the top symptoms. But to really break it down like this, it’s a totally different way of thinking. So, as you are doing this, do not get down on yourself. Wherever you don’t know the answer, just leave it blank. It’s totally fine. Totally, totally fine. All we are looking for is what can we impact? And you might realize that even if you have some blanks, you still have found some areas where you can impact the problem. I want you to know that this is true for people who are clinical herbalists who have been in practice for a long time. When I do this game, yes, there are still for me times that I’m like I don’t know about that part, but I can do some work over here. And sometimes doing some work over here unlocks information that wasn’t really available before.

(00:32:56):
Sometimes my whole approach to a problem is I do not think that what we see right now is the clear picture. I think that what we are seeing right now is really clouded by the fact that you’re only getting five hours of sleep a night. And right now we can’t tell which symptoms are really being caused by the five hours of sleep and which symptoms are being caused by the actual problem that you’re having. And so what I actually want to do is spend a month working on the sleep so that we can get a clear picture of what’s actually going on for this other thing. You need to know that that happens to me all the time, and that that’s a valid approach, a totally valid approach. So that when you are playing this game yourself, you’re not thinking oh, there was a blank I didn’t know the answer to. I guess I’m not a good herbalist. Heck no. There’s often areas where I don’t know the answer. And later, after we’ve been working for a month or two, or sometimes even six months, things bubble up to the surface that make it clear what the answer was to that question but not until later. Okay. So, you’re agreeing with me that you’re not going to use this part of the game to get down on yourself. If there are gaps, you’re just going to say yeah, that’s normal. That totally happens. But I’ve got these other areas of impact where I can start. Okay, excellent.

Rank Your List of Suggestions & Craft Email(s)

(00:34:25):
So, now we have this big list of lots of things that might help us move the needle for this person. And we may also have a list of some questions, not a problem. Now, sometimes you make this list, and it’s really small. That’s not a problem. It’s what you know right now. It’s where you’re going to start, and you can build on it in the future. So, if you’re like gee Katja, I played this game, and I made the list, and there were a whole two items on the list. So, I guess I’m never going to be a good herbalist. Heck no. That’s just the two items you’re going to start with. We’re going to add to it later. It’s going to be fine. If you need help finding sources to help you expand what you know right now, right? Sometimes the list is small because you’re a beginner, and you just don’t know a lot yet. That’s okay. But if you need help finding sources to do that, then get in touch with me so that I can help you find what you need. You can toss it in a discussion thread. You can send us an email. You can set up a quick help session. You can ask in live Q&A. But if you need help figuring out like geez, I don’t actually even know where I would look for the answer to this kind of a problem. Don’t stew on it. Just ask for help. Okay.

(00:35:49):
All right. So, you have this list. And before we move forward to our next step, I want you to just give yourself a gold star because this was a lot of work. This might actually have taken you several days. It might have taken you a week. Depending on your schedule, it could have taken longer. That is okay. And so when you told that person hey, this is actually really complicated and quite a lot of work. I can’t just rattle it off the top of my head right now. See, you were right. It took you a while to get to this point. So, gold star for you. And now we’re going to move on to the next step. All right. We’re going to look at the list that we’ve made, and we’re going to think about our person. And we’re going to think about what can we actually suggest to this person? So, some of the things we can’t suggest because they have a potential herb drug interaction, right? Okay, so fine. Some of the things on the list we could suggest, and maybe we really want to suggest, but they just don’t fit that person. They’re not going to be willing to do that. We just know oh, they’re never going to do that. Or they might do it, but they don’t have the resources for it. Now, part of working as a clinical herbalist is helping to motivate people to try things that maybe they would not previously have been willing to try. And helping to make those things accessible for them, whether that’s financially or in terms of their energy resources, or their time resources, or whatever else.

(00:37:22):
But for right now for our starting point, we’re just going to think about the things on the list that we think yeah, they might actually try that one. Okay. That’s where we’re going to start. And so we’re going to take whatever it is that we think they might try. We’re going to kind of rank it based on what do we think will get them the biggest impact. So, if you had a list of 10 things, and then you’re like well, these are the five things that I think they would be willing to try. Okay. Well, of that five, number one, I think it’ll only get them 5%. But number four, I think we’ll get them 25%. Okay, well then we’re going to start with number four, right? Because let’s get the biggest bang for the buck or the biggest bang for the effort right off the bat if we can. And then you might say okay, another thing would help. But it’s a low impact thing, but it’s easy to tack on to the first thing. Okay, well now instead of 25%, we get 30%. That’s great. So, whatever it is that we’ve chosen, the next step is we’re going to write them an email.

(00:38:31):
Now, we are not actually writing an email to the real person. We are writing something that looks like an email to this person, but we’re not actually going to give it to them. You can play this game for people who did not ask for your help, but you just know them, and you know what’s going on with them. Or you can play this game for people who did ask for your help, but you felt that it was not appropriate. Either way, we’re not going to be like oh hey, I thought of something that will fix all your problems, especially if they didn’t ask for help because they’re not going to appreciate that. This is just our own practice game. And so we’re writing them an email, but it’s not really going to them. It’s really just our practice. Okay. But imagine that you are writing it to them because everybody’s different. And different people have different experience in the kitchen or different levels of I don’t have a measuring cup, or I don’t have a teapot or whatever. Or I do have those things, and I’m really comfortable making tea.

(00:39:37):
So, if you imagine that you really are writing it to the person you have in mind, that is already going to build in new sets of challenges. Because you’re thinking about that person, and you’re like yeah, this person does not know how to boil water. Okay. So, the way that I explain this to this person is going to be different than the way that I would explain it to somebody who makes tea regularly and just wanted a little extra help. All right. So, go ahead and go through that process of writing out how you would explain it to them. And then put it aside for a day, come back to it, make sure it all makes sense to you. Make sure you didn’t leave anything out. Good. Now, as you go through this, the whole list and everything, you might realize that the only things that they would be willing to do are also low impact things. And so if that is the case. And you’re like man, this other thing would have a much stronger impact, but I don’t think they’re willing to do it. That’s a different email. And it’s important to practice that. In fact, you could write the email to this person 10 different ways just by arbitrarily saying okay, let’s shift the number of things that I think they would be willing to do, right? Okay. So, here’s that second email. You might say here’s the thing that I think will have the most impact. It might not appeal to you, but let me explain it and see if it sounds like something you might want to try. Okay, now we’re going to explain it. But then we’re going to go on. If that doesn’t appeal to you, here is another thing you can try. It will not have as strong of an impact, but it will get you started and now explain that thing.

(00:41:33):
If they in fact are not willing to try the thing you really wish they would do. And they say well, okay, I’ll do this other easier thing. And then they experience the results, and the results are not super impressive. That’s okay. Because you already told them that you didn’t think it would have nearly as much impact as the other suggestion. So, they know that there are more options that they could try, and they could follow up with you. And they won’t say oh well, herbs don’t work because I wasn’t impressed with my results. No, you already warned them that this was going to have less impact. So, this will encourage them to follow up with you instead of just giving up on herbs altogether. So, as you’re writing these imaginary practice emails, every sort of scenario like that that you can think of. Even if you’re writing the same email, but you’re just coming up with different like oh, they wouldn’t do that. They wouldn’t do this. Okay, now it’s a new email suddenly.

(00:42:38):
Every time you do that, you are building in flexibility and creativity into your skills. That gives you confidence. And then once you have, maybe you have six different versions of this email by now, right? All of this came from just one five-minute conversation with a friend last week. And now you’re here with all these different potential solutions and all these different imaginary emails where you have all these different scenarios that you’ve set up. Every time that you do this, you are strengthening the stuff that you have learned, strengthening your access to it in your brain, making everything go faster. Okay. It’s a little awkward at first, but every time you do it, you are increasing your speed. You are increasing your ability to be flexible when they surprise you and say oh, I would never do that, or I totally would do that, or whatever else might come up to surprise you. When you practice this, you are preparing yourself for those situations that are going to happen in the real world.

Get Feedback On Plans & Fill In Knowledge Gaps

(00:43:47):
All right. Now, once you’ve written this all out you might say gee, I really wish that I could get some feedback on this. So, you have a few options here. One is you can try it yourself. So, whatever it is that you’ve recommended to that person, just try it for like a week or two weeks and see what happens. Now, you may not have the same problems that they have, so you can’t be sure of exactly the impact that’ll happen to this person. But if what you were trying to do was relax gut cramping, and you don’t have gut cramping, but you still drank the tea every day that you were recommending to them, you will still feel relaxation. Okay, you didn’t have cramping, so you won’t know how much of an impact on the cramping it had. But you will know aha, relaxation did happen. Okay. I think this would have made an impact for that person, even if I don’t know exactly how much. The other benefit to trying the stuff that you would recommend to people is that if you have recommended them a tea, and it doesn’t taste good, then you know that it didn’t taste good. Sometimes you’re like oh, these are the perfect herbs for this person. And you’re not thinking about what it’s going to taste like. You’re just thinking about the actions and how it will help them. And then you try it, and you’re like oh, I can’t give this to somebody. They’re never going to be able to drink this. So, that’s another reason that it’s really good to try it yourself. Okay. So, that’s one way that you can know did this work or did it not work? Did I do a good job on this?

(00:45:25):
Okay. But the other way that you can know is you can send it to your herb teacher. So if that’s us, send it to us. Ask us for feedback. And we can let you know yeah, this is good. Here are some gaps in your approach. And we can help you line up the resources that you need to help you boost up whatever areas you had gaps in. So, just make sure that you have anonymized it. Dear friend, not the person’s name or anything like that. We’re not putting anything that would identify that person if you’re going to send it to a teacher for feedback. And again, you’re not going to give this to the person. This is you building your confidence. And by now it’s not the same thing as that person, right? Because you’ve added in pharmaceuticals, you’ve added in all kinds of other things to make it more challenging. Totally fine. But getting that feedback is your opportunity to talk with your teachers about okay, how I thought this through, yes. Okay, I was good in all these areas, and my strategy was solid. And we can make a prediction about whether or not we think it would have helped this imaginary person or not. But it really is going to help you to say okay, I actually did this. And also somebody looked it over and said yeah, I think this is a good approach.

(00:46:48):
Again, you never have to tell your friend that you were practicing with the health information that they told you about. In fact, I would not tell them, right? Because your friends don’t want you to be an herbal nag. They don’t want to feel like you’re butting into their business, or trying to judge them because they eat Oreos, or whatever else. That is okay. You’re practicing, and this is just a scenario for you to work with. It is like a case study that is built, and now you’re taking it offline. It’s not really about that person anymore. It’s about your learning, but you have a person in mind that you are targeting your responses to. So, the more that you build up these scenarios, even though you’re not actually telling the people. That part doesn’t actually matter because right now this is about building your confidence. The more that you do these kinds of scenarios, the more that you are solidifying the material that you are learning. The more that you are becoming flexible, and creative, and fast at thinking through each step of the process. And the more that you are getting good at researching the gaps in your knowledge. You’re getting faster and faster at doing that. There are always going to be gaps in your knowledge. Don’t think that there will ever be a time when that disappears, but this is going to make you faster at filling them in.

A Heart Issues Example: Define Our Goals

(00:48:19):
All right. Well, let’s have an example, shall we? Okay. So, this one came from Q&A last week. Janet was playing this game using her neighbor as her example. So, here’s the information that she gave us to start off. A friend has a heart issue. He’s an older fellow, but we don’t know the age exactly. He’s got atrial fibrillation, and his heart rate is going fast. He has a pacemaker. We don’t know how long he has had it. He has Raynaud’s. He’s taking multiple blood pressure pills, multiple blood thinners, thyroid pills, and a statin. He was taking beta blockers, but he stopped. He’s been a big drinker in the past, but recently he’s finding that he really can’t tolerate it. His body is rejecting the drink. He just can’t do it anymore, even though he used to drink a lot and every night. He eats vegetables, but really what he likes is cake. Usually his meals are meat, and starch, and a little vegetable, and then cake. And he’s had COVID several times. And in practice, in the beginning of this process, she said my goal is to try and reduce his heart rate. Okay. So, first let’s think about that goal. And we worked through this in Q&A, but now we can do this as an example here. First, let’s think about that goal. Is reducing the heart rate even possible? You can pause this if you need to and just think about it for a few minutes.

(00:50:02):
All right, ready? No. That is not specific enough because he’s taking drugs that impact his heart rate, and his pacemaker impacts his heart rate. So, if we just say lower his heart rate, how would we even know if we did it actually? Now okay, we can get diagnostic information from the pacemaker depending on what kind of pacemaker he has and how new or old it is. Some won’t have that information available, some will. But the point here is that there are a lot of overrides that are already in place on the heart issue. So, it’s going to be challenging, especially if we can’t see the diagnostic information from the pacemaker. It’s going to be challenging for us to even know if we succeeded at reducing his heart rate. That goal alone does not really give us an entry point. Now, you might be thinking well, he could just take hawthorn. This is easy, right? Well, can he? We don’t actually know what drugs he’s taking. We know that he’s taking multiple blood pressure medications, and some blood pressure medications interact with hawthorn. And we don’t really know what gets his heart rate up to begin with, which is actually important. So, we don’t actually know enough right now to say that hawthorn could help. Even though if you’ve studied a little bit of herbalism, hawthorn probably jumped right to your mind.

(00:51:39):
Okay, put that aside. We’re not ready to say that yet. Okay. So, depending on the kind of pacemaker that he has, and depending on which drugs he’s taking, which we don’t know, one thing we might be able to do successfully is reduce the triggers that create the irregular heart rate in the first place. So in other words, if we can look at what gets his heart racing, then we might find areas that we can impact and impact noticeably. So, if we don’t know what his actual triggers are, then that’s okay. We can make them up, right, because this is just practice. So, we can just say okay… Because we don’t have this information, right? But we’re just going to make it up. His heart races when he has to go upstairs, and also when his temper gets heated up, and whenever he drinks alcohol. Okay. And then we can think about maybe some longer-term causes. Those are situational causes. If one of those things happens pretty fast afterwards, his heart starts to race.

(00:52:46):
All right. So, then we can look at some longer-term causes like sugar consumption and an overall high level of baseline inflammation in the body, which we know is there because of other factors. He has Raynaud’s. We know that that’s a chronic inflammatory/autoimmune-related condition. And this has been going on for some period of time. We don’t know exactly how long but a while. All of these are inflammatory, chronic inflammatory issues. So, we know that that has been a long-term contributor. We don’t know for sure, but it would not be unreasonable for this person to be pre-diabetic. So, that also is something that we can think about in our mind, right? Okay. Also, if we’re thinking about long-term causes, we can think about COVID. Because one of COVID’s biggest impacts is in the blood vessels. It damages the tissue of the arterial walls, and that creates more inflammation and can raise blood pressure. High alcohol consumption can also cause these same symptoms, and high sugar consumption can create that same scenario. So, we are seeing three causes in his history that are creating damage in the blood vessels. And we also know that’s a really good place for herbs to do work. That’s a hook that we can grab onto or like an on-ramp where we can have impact. Okay, good. So, we put that on our list.

(00:54:25):
We can also think about herbs and other strategies for stress management to try to limit the times that his temper gets up. And we can look at the diet to think about some alternatives to sugary treats so that we can remove one cause of inflammation that way, right? Okay. So, to me I’m looking at this list, and I’m thinking stress management and lowering inflammation levels, especially in the blood vessels themselves, are two things that I can do and that will ultimately reduce the frequency of a racing heart. Now, we don’t know the size of the impact it will have for this person, but we do know that in a person it would have that impact. So, that’s a goal we can work with. Now, ultimately the net result is likely to be similar to her original goal. If we are reducing the frequency of the racing heart episodes, that does look like bring his heart rate down. But now we have a really specific plan about how we can do that based on the areas where we are likely to have success And in a mechanism where we can see if we actually did anything. Because if we just try to bring the heart rate down, well, the meds and the pacemaker are doing that already. But if we’re really trying to reduce the number of racing heart episodes that he has, we can get information back from the pacemaker – assuming it is a pacemaker that has diagnostic information available – to see how often did it kick in. And if it is kicking in less often, then we are in fact reducing the frequency of his racing heart episodes. So, we can actually even know if we did something here.

How Do We Get There: Choosing Herbs

(00:56:23):
All right. So, now we need to think about how can we do this? And we’re going to just list out all the things that can help us repair the damage to the vasculature, especially to the arteries. And that’s the first thing. So, pause this if you want to play along at home and go ahead and make a list of all the things that you can think of. Okay, ready? Now I’m going to tell you mine. All right. We know that one of the biggest areas of impact for the damage in the blood vessels specifically is the endothelial lining of the vasculature. That endothelial lining is what gets damaged by COVID. And also it gets damaged from alcohol, gets damaged from sugar. That is where the inflammation is biggest. So, we can be thinking about vulneraries here in the exact same way that we would think about them for the digestive tract or even for the skin, because it is all the same kind of cell. Your skin, the lining of your digestive tract, and the lining of your blood vessels, and the lining of many other things like the inside of your bladder and other areas of the body, it’s all thelial cells. It’s all endothelial cells except your actual skin. That’s epithelial cells because it’s on the outside. But it’s all the same kind of cell. So, we know that vulneraries that work in the digestive tract are going to help with the endothelial cells everywhere throughout the body. So, let’s make a list. We can talk about calendula, and plantain, and chamomile, and goldenrod, and self-heal, and that’s a good start. There’s a whole lot of vulneraries, but let’s work with those five.

(00:58:14):
So, we have this list. And now what do we need to think about? Well, first we need to think about his drugs, and do we see any drug interactions there? Now we don’t know exactly which ones he’s taking, but we know that there are multiple blood thinners and multiple for blood pressure. The thyroid med is not nearly as challenging to work with, and the statin is also not as challenging. Okay. So, it’s the blood pressure and the blood thinners that we’re thinking about here the most. And because we don’t know which ones he’s taking, that makes it hard for us to be very specific about safety. However, calendula and chamomile both have super safe profiles that have very little chance of drug interaction. And so if we stick with those two, we get really good vulnerary action. They don’t taste too bad. They’re pretty easy to get. And the likelihood of an interaction with the drugs that he’s taking is very minimal. So, that’s a really safe starting point.

(00:59:21):
So, now we’ve got our vulneraries. Let’s think about any other mechanisms that we have to repair damage in the vasculature, because what if he doesn’t like that idea, right? We should come up with some more. All right. Well, one way is antioxidants. Now, hawthorn falls into that category, but we’re already thinking about drug interactions for hawthorn. And so we kind of pushed it off the list because we’re just not sure what we’re working with. Does that mean that there’s nothing that we can work with? Pause me if you want. All right. Let’s think about some other ones. Garlic, really good except very likely to interact with the blood thinners. So okay, not garlic. Ginger, the same. But what about berries? Food berries here. Not like hawthorn medicinal berry, but food berries. Raspberries, blueberries, cranberries, blackberries, those are all fine. Totally safe and really very effective, plus they have fiber. And I am certain with this fellow’s diet that he has not mentioned any sort of bowel issues, but I bet they’re there. I bet they’re there. So, heck, we can do work in the vasculature and help in the digestive system at the same time. Right?

(01:00:41):
Okay. So, so far we’ve got calendula, and chamomile, and berries every day. Now, those berries can do dual duty here because if we can create a berry dessert that he likes, then that can help reduce his sugar intake if we’re replacing the cake with the berries. Which we may be able to do, especially if we put a little cinnamon on top and maybe put some slivered almonds or something else fancy with it. It might be appealing to him. He’s already reducing his alcohol, whether he wants to or not. His body is saying we have to reduce the alcohol. And so that base is fairly well covered. So, just between calendula, chamomile, and berries, we’ve actually got a lot of impact in a lot of different areas, right? Okay. Certainly there are many more suggestions that we can have, but these are good ones. Let’s stick with these.

(01:01:45):
Now let’s move on to stress management and think about that. What would be something that we could work with long term to help him create a more stable temper and short term when he feels his temper rising in a moment? This might not be the same thing. We might have two different solutions for this. Now this is not going to be the same for every person, of course, depending on what gets the temper up to begin with. So, we have to do a little imagination here, and we should be specific. Let us be specific about what the problem is even though we’re making it up, because that’s going to allow us to be specific about what we’re going to suggest. Okay. So, we are going to imagine that he is ruminating on things in his past that still upset him. And that when he feels sadness or grief, he masks that with anger because the sad feeling is too hard to bear. All right. So, that’s kind of two different… Let’s say something, a business partner betrayed him in his past. And when he ruminates on that, it gets him really angry again. And then when he has feelings of sadness or grief, he masks that with anger.

(01:03:03):
Okay. So, pause if you need to, or if you just want to, and think about what could we do here to help with those two things? Okay. So, we might be thinking about skullcap and passionflower to help with the rumination. We might be thinking about tulsi. We might be thinking about blue vervain, right? Things in the past that we can’t control anymore. We might also think about something like linden or rose for the sadness that is expressing as anger. Linden might help for the anger that’s expressing as anger also, but I’m really thinking of it in that sadness category. All right, that’s enough for us to think about for a minute. Obviously there are like 10,000 more ideas, but let’s work with these for the moment. So, before we make a choice, we need to think about our drug interactions again. So, overall, wait a minute, what were those herbs again? Skullcap, passionflower, tulsi, blue vervain, linden, and rose. All right. So, overall, these are herbs that are really safe and generally unlikely to have drug interactions. The tulsi, I think would probably be fine. I’m not worried about it too much as a blood thinner or with the blood pressure, but of all of them it is the most likely to have some sort of interaction. So, I think let’s maybe set that one aside. We can come back to it in the future if we want to. But let’s think about skullcap and linden just to keep things really, really simple. Skullcap to focus on the rumination and linden to focus on the sadness masking as anger.

Design a Protocol, Communicate Expectations, & Track Progress

(01:05:02):
Okay. Now we’ve come up with calendula, chamomile, skullcap, and linden. And that is not a bad formula. It will taste pretty decent. If we make it in equal parts, it’ll taste pretty good. And if we’re just making one tea blend for him, that is a lot easier for him to manage. So, it’s just this one infusion. He can drink it throughout the day. If he makes a quart in the morning, then he can just have it all day long. And if we keep it super simple like that, then he is more likely to do it. And that is just as important as the herbs that we choose, right? Because we could choose the most perfect herbs on the planet, but if he doesn’t take them, it doesn’t really matter. It doesn’t matter how perfect they were. So, I think that these four herbs are actually really pretty perfect. And we can package them in a way that makes it very easy for him to actually do it every day. So, that combined with the food changes that we want to make, I think we’re looking at a really good starting point for the first month. We can reevaluate. We can make adjustments based on how he feels, based on what results he gets. Obviously we would tell this person that this is our starting point. This is not like the solution to his everything. This is a supportive assistant to try to reduce stress, reduce inflammation, reduce the number of times that the pacemaker has to kick in, hopefully. And I think that we can make an impact that way.

(01:06:42):
All right. Obviously there’s so much more we can work with. He certainly has some food sensitivities. Raynaud’s alone is an indicator for that. We could definitely be looking at improving liver health, especially after the lifetime of heavier drinking. We could definitely be doing more work on stress management for him. And we haven’t even talked about sleep yet, but sleep is probably also an issue. Movement is going to be important, but we’ll have to be a little bit careful there. Because we don’t want to get his heart rate up too much through movement, but we don’t want him to be sedentary either. So, that’s an area we can investigate with him or that he might investigate with a physical therapist. He might have a physical therapist because he has a pacemaker. Or he might have had one and stopped going, and we could encourage him to start that back up again. But in terms of building a starting point that is likely to have a perceptible impact, something that he will feel, that he will notice, and also be simple enough for him to succeed at daily, I think this is a really good goal.

(01:07:50):
Okay. So, now if we are going to communicate this to him, we need to explain where is he going to get everything? How is he going to make it? Exactly how. And exactly how is this going to fit into his day? And we’re going to need some collaboration from him on that because we don’t really know what his schedule is like. But we need to fit our work into his schedule in a way that he likes, including the acquisition of the things. If he has a habit about how often he goes to the grocery store, well, do berries fit into that habit? Does he need to go a little more often because berries don’t last super long in the refrigerator? Whatever it is, we need to figure out that what we have planned is actually feasible for him. We also want to make really sure in our communication with him that he understands what the purpose is and what the results are that we expect. And we want to be really specific. The specific part wasn’t just so that we pick a good strategy. It’s also so that he understands what he’s doing and why he’s doing it. Because if he understands what he’s doing and why he’s doing it, he is more likely to do it.

(01:09:04):
All right. We want to explain any potential for adverse interactions if we see any. Here I don’t expect any, but we can leave it open-ended. We can say something like if anything feels weird, or if you don’t like it, let me know right away so that I can make an adjustment that’s better for you. If we know that there is a potential adverse reaction, then we can tell him to be watching for that specific thing. But in this case I don’t expect one, but I don’t want to say nothing. I want him to know that if something feels weird, he should tell me right away because I don’t want him to feel weird. And also, what if there’s an adverse reaction that I didn’t think of? What if there was something that I didn’t expect? What if there was a drug he didn’t tell me about? Okay. And then ideally we would want him to get some data. So, we need to think through how do we want to track the results in a way that’s not onerous for him? Now in this case, again, his pacemaker might give us the results we need depending on what kind of pacemaker it is and whether or not he has access to the diagnostics himself. If he does, he may be able to see how often the pacemaker kicks in to bring his heart rate down. And we can compare that against the previous month.

(01:10:28):
But we can also think a little bit more subjectively about this. We can just have him make a tally mark on a calendar every time that he feels his temper rising or his heart racing. And if we have a little bit of before data, even if it’s just a couple days, then that will help us for comparison. And so each day you can just have a regular, the kind of calendar that has a whole month on one page and has a picture at the top. It doesn’t have to be anything fancier than that. And just make a tally mark on each day however many times that happened. So, each day we can count up the tally marks. And ideally at the end of the month there will be fewer than there were at the beginning of the month. And then at the end of the month we can talk about it, and we can make adjustments, or we can move on to the next goal. But if we have a little bit of data, then that helps us know for sure did what we tried, did it actually work?

(01:11:25):
So, there you go. That’s our game. That’s how we play it. And if you can set aside time once a week to play a game like this. You don’t have to start off with a complicated situation with a pacemaker, and a bunch of drugs, and whatever else. I use that example because I want you to know you can play it on hard mode, and that’s totally fine. But you could start with something super easy. My friend gets headaches, or my friend has indigestion after eating meals that are too large. It can start off with the easiest possible thing. That’s totally fine. Whatever it is that you think is easy. But the more often you do this, and the more that you push yourself a little each time to get a little harder, a little harder. I promise you the more comfortable you are going to get with your skills, relying on yourself, relying on the knowledge that you have learned and the skills that you have developed. I mean, that’s why you’re doing this. That’s why you’re learning this stuff so that you can rely on your own brain and your own guts to help other people. And this is how you’re going to get there.

(01:12:35):
And of course you can get there by studying with us. Remember that for the whole month of July, it’s our semi-annual sale. Everything is 20% off. Use code CATNIP at online.commonwealthherbs.com. And if you need any help choosing a course, or figuring out where to start, or what courses will meet your goals, seriously, I’m not kidding. Really, you can email me. I will answer you. It’s info@commonwealthherbs.com. All right, this is the part of the podcast where Ryn would say take care of yourselves. Take care of each other. Drink some tea. And play a practice game to increase your confidence. Bye-bye.

Our semi-annual 20% off sale is coming soon!

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How do you know when you can trust an herbalism teacher, influencer, book, or blog? How can you determine whether a scientific study has relevant information for your practice? Vetting your herbalism sources of information is an essential skill for students and practitioners alike.

Today’s episode, we lay out some red flags and green flags for this determination. These are indicators that you should be more cautious or skeptical on the one hand, or on the other hand that you can feel more trust in what you’re told. They’re not absolutes – no one data point is determinative – but they can help you more swiftly come to a decision.

You can absolutely learn from teachers with flaws. In fact, you’ll have to! We all have them. Still, if someone is out there telling you “this herb is Amish ibuprofen” or “this herb is nature’s Ozempic”, those are strong signals that this person isn’t interested in a grounded, nuanced, and detailed understanding of how herbs work in humans. Similar signals come from statements like “these are the lost secrets of ancient wisdom”, “everyone needs to take this one special herb”, and “the government & big pharma don’t want you to know…” Each of these might begin from a truth or half-truth, but they obscure true history, individual variation, and the actual causes of over-medicalization in our society. Those who pass them on uncritically, or use them to gin up likes & follows, are doing you – and all herbalists – a disservice.

Green flags for an herbal ‘authority’ include clarity of context: “this herb is helpful here, for these people, for these problems; but not there, for those, or that.” This context can include elements such as energetic indications, action-centered (as opposed to disease-centered) claims about herbal efficacy, realistic consideration of contraindications or drug interactions, and a lot of specificity about format, dose, frequency, duration, and the other practical elements of how people work with herbs in the real world. The more of these you see a person offer, the more reliable you may judge their information to be.

Scientific articles about herbs – and even moreso, popular press publications about those articles – carry red flags and green flags, too. The first step is always to assess whether a study, trial, or review article tells you anything which really applies to the work you do. If it’s billed as an investigation into calamus safety, but it’s actually a study of a single constituent of calamus essential oil, injected into mice at doses one could literally never encounter via eating calamus root, drinking its decoction, or taking its tincture – well, that’s interesting, but it doesn’t have any practical impact on whether you include calamus in a formula for your client.

The basics of reading & understanding scientific studies come forward here. Is it on general populations, or a specific group of people (children, elders, those with a particular disease state)? Is it an actual trial on humans, or an animal study – or an in vitro / in silico investigation? If it’s a review article, how did they select which sources to include and exclude?

All that is true even before we get into the issue of AI articles and AI citations, but when you see those it’s one of the reddest red flags of all. Even without the influence of AI, basic science errors (like mismatch between the botanical and common names of plants under study) can pop up. Then there are issues of funding, conflicts of interest, and the scourge of selective publication. Green flags, on the other hand, rise up when we find a study which includes traditional syndrome differentiations – the application of herbal energetics in the selection / review process of the trial. When a study’s done on a ‘crude extract’, like tea or tincture you can make at home, that’s another sign that this information may really matter to you. Ideally, we’d get studies done on free-living humans, with the types of remedies we actually recommend to our clients – so again, the question comes down to: how close is this to our actual work?

We’d like for everyone to go to an herbalism school where you can ask the teachers these kinds of questions, anytime you want. That’s the kind of learning environment we provide! We like to we raise green flags, and we’d love for you to learn with us! But… you might want to wait for July 1st, that’s when our big summer sale begins!

Everything’s on sale in July!

All our offerings are self-paced online video courses. They all come with free access to twice-weekly live Q&A sessions with us, lifetime access to current & future course material, open discussion threads integrated in each lesson, an active student community, study guides, quizzes & capstone assignments, and more!

Use code CATNIP at checkout to get 20% off!

Mentioned in this episode:

• HHP 065: How To Not Be A Guru
• HHP 125: This Is Not The Practice Of Medicine
• HHP 215: Don’t Let the Feds Get You Down

If you have a moment, it would help us a lot if you could subscribe, rate, & review our podcast wherever you listen. This helps others find us more easily. Thank you!!

Our theme music is “Wings” by Nicolai Heidlas.

Episode Transcript

Katja (00:00:16):
Hi, I’m Katja.

Ryn (00:00:17):
And I’m Ryn.

Katja (00:00:18):
And we’re here at Commonwealth Holistic Herbalism in Boston, Massachusetts.

Ryn (00:00:22):
And on the internet everywhere, thanks to the power of the podcast. All right. Episode 283 naturally.

Katja (00:00:31):
That’s a large number.

Ryn (00:00:33):
That’s a decent number.

Katja (00:00:34):
Yeah.

Ryn (00:00:34):
Yeah. Is it a prime number? I don’t know. Let’s not do math today. Let’s do some herbalism. Yeah.

Katja (00:00:42):
Yeah. So, a question that comes up a lot for students and just people interested in herbalism is how do you know if the information that you are seeing is trustworthy? Whether that is a teacher, or somebody on social media, or a book, or whatever, how do you know if you can trust that or not? And this is a huge topic but… And it has grown a lot from the days where it was well, you just know every herbalist. You know them all personally, and then you just know if you can trust them or not.

Ryn (00:01:27):
There’s a couple dozen books, and you can read all of them, and that’s basically what you’ve got access to.

Katja (00:01:31):
Yeah, that’s it. Yeah.

Ryn (00:01:33):
But it’s a different world. We have the entire internet full of information of varying quality, and we need ways to sort through it.

Katja (00:01:43):
Yeah.

Ryn (00:01:44):
And that includes stuff produced by herbalists, and holistic health educators, and teachers, and so on. But it also includes scientific studies and papers that may be relevant to herbs, or herbal extracts, or commercial products, or maybe some mixture of all of the above. Yeah.

Katja (00:02:01):
Basically kind of any source that’s talking to you about herbs, and/or health, and/or your body.

Ryn (00:02:08):
Yeah.

Katja (00:02:10):
Yeah.

Ryn (00:02:10):
So we’re going to try and give you some things to look out for as you analyze information that you come across. Ways to identify what could be reliable and what you might want to look at a little more critically. Yeah. Looking for some red flags, some green flags, that kind of thing. But first we just want to give you our reclaimer. That’s where we remind you that we’re not doctors. We are herbalists and holistic health educators.

Katja (00:02:34):
The ideas discussed in this podcast do not constitute medical advice. No state or federal authority licenses herbalists in the United States. So, these discussions are for educational purposes only.

Ryn (00:02:45):
We want to remind you that good health doesn’t mean the same thing for everyone. Good health doesn’t exist as one objective standard. It’s influenced by your individual needs, experiences, and goals. So, keep in mind we’re not attempting to present one, single, dogmatic right way that you must adhere to.

Katja (00:03:01):
Everyone’s body is different. So, the things that we’re talking about may or may not apply directly to you. But we hope that they’ll give you some new information to think about and some ideas to research or experiment with further.

Ryn (00:03:13):
Finding your way to better health is both your right and your own personal responsibility. This doesn’t mean that you’re alone on the journey, and it doesn’t mean that you’re to blame for your current state of health. But it does mean that the final decision when you’re considering any course of action, whether it’s discussed on the internet or prescribed by a physician, that’s always your choice to make. Even if you find somebody discussing things on the internet who you really, really love and you really, really like. And you think ah, they’re probably just right about everything.

Katja (00:03:39):
I should just do whatever they say.

Ryn (00:03:41):
I’ll just turn my brain off. It’s tempting, right? It’s a natural human, I don’t know, mammalian, I don’t know, living being temptation to look for something that seems like the easy way and then to follow that.

The Temptation to Trust

Katja (00:03:54):
You know, if we call it the easy way, then that has a lot of value judgment kind of associated with it. But if we call it the resource efficient way, then suddenly it becomes a little bit more understandable. There’s a lot of data that your brain has to process in a day. There actually always has been, but now there’s sort of an unreasonable amount, and your brain is looking for ways to conserve resources. So, any place where it can find a pattern and say oh, I like the way that person dresses, and therefore I think I trust them. That’s not like well boy, that’s a dumb criteria. Okay. Maybe that’s not a great criteria, but it’s also just your brain looking for efficiency. And so that’s challenging because brains look for efficiency, bodies also look for efficiency. Which means that we have to be holding them back all the time saying hold on, hold on, hold on. No, no, don’t trust that yet. I like their earrings is not enough information for me to trust them.

Ryn (00:05:03):
Yeah. We are all susceptible to this. Even once you’ve learned about cognitive biases and the ways in which our brains trick us, or look for shortcuts, or look for the resource efficient method to get to something that’s shaped like an answer. Those things can all be true, and yet you can be aware of those things. You can know about them. You can have researched logical fallacies and so on. But you can still be susceptible to them. That’s like the first, most important thing to keep in mind.

Katja (00:05:30):
It doesn’t make you a bad person. It just means you have a brain.

Ryn (00:05:34):
Yeah, right. Fortunately, your brain can also help with this problem. And we can learn habits of thinking, habits of interrupting ourselves in a moment like that. Ways to kind of trigger an internal audit when we’re encountering something and being like wow, that seems great. Hang on. Hang on. Let me check this a little more closely. So, that’s something that you can also teach yourself to do.

Katja (00:06:03):
Yeah. Yeah. And listen, it’s critically important. Because although I do want to be clear, there have always been bad herb teachers. There have always been significant problems in the wellness space. By the way, the wellness space has existed a lot longer than you probably think. And this talking about health, and how to be healthy, and what healthy even is has always been problematic. There have always been tendencies to make it quasi-religious, or to make it a morality statement, or a statement on whether you personally are a good person or a bad person, or whatever else. It has always also been hijacked by corporate interests. And I do not mean that in a conspiracy theory kind of way. I simply mean it as like this is a place to make money. And when people want to make money, they will do the thing that makes them money. And sometimes those things are not ethical or trustworthy. It doesn’t have to be a conspiracy to be uncool.

Ryn (00:07:23):
Yeah. The conception of the corporation as it operates in our society today is structurally inclined to do these things.

Katja (00:07:33):
Yeah. It’s hard to say that because there are so many conspiracy theories running around today. Even if you think you’re immune to conspiracy theories, you might be surprised to realize that you maybe have a couple in there in your brain. Because again, this is something that all people are susceptible to. But I’m really not referring to any specific one of those. I am simply referring to any time that we are talking about something where it’s hard to know the answer, and people can make money, then that’s kind of a recipe for some exploitation. And the reality is it is hard to know the answer about human health because there are no guarantees except that we are all going to die. And when the question we’re asking is how do I feel better, or not die, or whatever, then there are no guarantees. There just are no guarantees. But we want the confidence, we want the reassurance, we want the comfort. And so this is why it’s so hard to trust and why we have to say that you have to think two or three times before trusting people or more times than that even simply because this is an area where we as consumer, each one of us as consumers of information, or listeners, or learners, or whatever want to believe. And often the people who are telling us things that we want to believe are also trying to get money from us. And that’s just a bad combo.

Ryn (00:09:27):
Yes.

Katja (00:09:28):
But people have to pay bills. This is one of those awful spirals of if only we could do all this without money. But then how would anybody buy food?

Ryn (00:09:40):
You run into a different set of problems.

Katja (00:09:41):
It’s a totally different set of problems. Yeah.

How to Assess Herbal Information Sources: Verify It’s a Real Person

Ryn (00:09:44):
All right. So, let’s think a little bit here about how we can assess somebody that we come across. This is somebody who is offering information. Maybe they’re putting themselves out there as a teacher, or an expert, or maybe a product maker, or some other thing. They’re saying I’ve got information for you about herbs, about health, and you should check it out. So, that’s great. We want to have lots of people out there sharing their experiences, their ideas, their theories. All of those things are good. but we do need to be able to assess each one and say is this helpful to me? Is this realistic? Is this information that is actually going to be functional in some manner? Or is this misleading? Is there a gap here? Is there an error? Something like that.

Katja (00:10:31):
And that might be a little place to put an asterisk because it is really important to know that everybody makes errors. Every solid, good herbalist I know regrets something they wrote in a book. And then later they want to go back and change it because they got better information or whatever. Or something they said on a video, and they’re like oh man, I said that three years ago. And now I learned this new thing, and I really wish I could go back and change that or whatever. Okay. That is one thing. Everybody makes mistakes. And so please expect that your herb teachers, no matter how much you love them, have made mistakes. And then when you see something, and you’re like that doesn’t quite jive, ask them. Because maybe it is like when I think about our online program, there’s over 3,000 videos across all the different programs that we teach. And some of them I have not had a chance to go back and be like oh, I need to update this one thing in here or whatever. And so it’s important to always be able to ask. And that’s one of the things you should look for in a program is that you can ask. But I want to make a distinction between somebody made a mistake somewhere or said something but later had updated information that they want to update. That’s one thing. And that’s different than somebody who just is unqualified, or is putting up misinformation, or is scamming, those kinds of things.

Ryn (00:12:14):
Yeah, right. So, you can learn from teachers with flaws. You can learn from teachers who’ve made mistakes. And you’re going to have to because we all have flaws, and we all make mistakes. Okay. But then there are folks who are out there who are presenting information or sharing information. And whether they are aware of it or not, the things that they’re saying are inaccurate, potentially problematic, potentially even dangerous in some circumstances. It does happen. Herbs are very forgiving in this regard. There are many ways people could work with herbs that I think are not optimal or not realistic for the job at hand, like offering a dose of an herb for a symptom or a health condition that’s really too small to accomplish anything at all. So, I might have a disagreement with that. But that’s different from somebody who is just kind of running with whatever they’ve got and making a bunch of wild claims, and statements, and things like that. Not really following up on them. Not really basing it on anything super solid. And also really speaking in ways that kind of call out to you, and say something is amiss here. Something is off. So, those are the things we’re going to try to point out. Before that though when you’re trying to learn about somebody, they’ve come across your feed, or you’ve heard somebody talk about them, or you see their name on a book title or whatever else, you want to know who that person is. So, you can pause right there, and you can say all right, well what can I find about this individual? Can I find some things that they’ve put out there for free before I go, and I start giving them some money?

Katja (00:13:54):
And even in this category we have to ask ourselves are they even an actual human? Because that is now a significant problem. And a couple weeks ago this was a problem that a student came to me with. An Instagram account for somebody who had written a book, and it looked like a real human. And the book was an AI book with a fake author. It is not a real person, not a real author. And that book has been around for a little while. But now it looks like they hired an actress to embody the supposed author, even though the person that they hired is considerably older than the picture of the author. Okay, fine. And they’re putting out all these Instagram reels now. It might also just be an AI actor. It’s really unclear. Previously that account was only graphics. And then it was like turning a switch that suddenly it was this person or an AI that looks like a person making these reels. And also with fantastical claims and whatever else. But that was kind of amazing to be like we had already established that this book was an AI book by a fake author. And now there’s this person or maybe not even a real person impersonating this fake author. And it’s all about marketing trying to get people to buy this book. So yeah, so first find out if they’re even a real person.

Ryn (00:15:39):
Right. Yeah. And so if they are an herbalist, if they are a practitioner, then they should have some kind of a presence, right? One way or another. That could be some classes that they offer, some writings that they’ve got for you to read through. It could be that they’ve done interviews, whether on their own platform, or their own material, their own podcast, whatever. Or that they go over to somebody else’s show, and they turn up there, and they do an interview. And you can see what they’re like when they’re having a conversation or something like that. It’s maybe very helpful in the modern context with the AI situation if there is something live or something recorded with other humans where you’re like okay, that’s an actual human being. They take up space. They have mass. They breathe. They have a metabolism. All right, cool. That’s good to know. And that is, like you said, something we actually have to confirm in the world today.

Look for Depth to a Presence & Information That is Sourced

Katja (00:16:36):
We will come back to this number, but last September there was a study done on herb books for sale on Amazon by a group that studies AI in the world. And they found that 82% of all of the books in the herbal health space in Amazon were actually fake books written by AI. No actual human associated with it. And one of the ways that you can tell, and so this will be also how you can tell if this is a real person or not, is if their presence, like their website, and their Instagram, and their whatever is only about that one book. And they don’t have a website that has depth of dates, like it’s been around for a long time. Or they might be a new person who hasn’t been around for a really long time, but they should still have some depth there. And if it is literally just my only existence is this one book. This is the only thing I ever talk about. This is the only thing at all. Then that might be an indication that it’s not a real person. So, you’re looking for… It’s fine if somebody has a specialization, and they talk about a particular topic very frequently. But you want to see depth. You want to see a variety of things that this person has done.

Ryn (00:18:05):
Yeah. And when you’re listening to somebody’s recorded class, or you’re attending some little live event that they do every now and then to meet new people or to tell people what they’re up to and what they offer, that’s great. And that can tell you if you kind of jive with what they’re offering, if you like their impression, if they seem interesting to you. None of this has yet established for you if all the things that they’re saying are fully trustworthy or completely accurate. That work still remains. And then at the same level, things like how popular this person is, their follower account, the number of likes and shares their posts get, their name recognition, other things like that. Those are indicators, but they’re not determinative. Those also don’t answer for you in some kind of final way about whether you can put some trust into what this person’s putting out there.

Katja (00:18:59):
Yeah.

Ryn (00:19:00):
Yeah. All right. You should be turning all of these thoughts on us as well, by the way, just to make sure that’s clear from the beginning.

Katja (00:19:07):
Yeah.

Ryn (00:19:07):
Yeah. All right. So, imagine what we’re talking about here includes can I trust that person? But people are variable. So we’re really like can you trust what they offer in a class, in a book, on their blog posts, or whatever, that kind of thing. And so you can get very granular about this. You can say okay, so for each blog post they put out, for each chapter of the book, whatever, each sentence in there, what are they giving me about what they’re saying? Is there a source for the claims that are being presented in this manner? They’re telling you something about hawthorn being good for the heart. Maybe you’ve heard that before. Maybe they’re saying something that’s a little bit different from what you’ve encountered, or adding another layer, or whatever else. But you’re like okay, why do you say that? That’s the thing to ask. Where do you get this idea from? And people will have lots of different kinds of sources for those sorts of claims. That’s normal in herbalism. We don’t have only one source of information. We don’t take everything we say as only reliable if it comes from the scientific process. That’s one of our sources of information, but there are others.

Katja (00:20:22):
But also don’t expect a teacher to have a study to back up every single claim because there are not studies that will back up every single claim. Some things are from your own experience. And then the question is is that experience worth trusting?

Ryn (00:20:43):
Yeah. If essentially a person is putting a bunch of ideas, and claims, and so on forward, and ultimately what they have to back it up is my experience. Well, my experience as an herbalist has shown me that this herb is helpful for this problem. Or my experience as a practitioner has shown me that this herb extracts really well in this particular ratio of alcohol to water. And that’s the reason why I like to make my tinctures that way best. Okay, great. So, that’s not nothing. That’s not invalid. But it does make me curious, what is your experience then? How long have you been doing this? And in what contexts have you been doing this work? Like maybe somebody’s been doing their work for decades, but with a very specific population. And that could be that they’ve done all kinds of work with pregnant humans for years and years, but now maybe they’re looking to branch out a little bit. And now they’re making some broader claims about everybody. Everybody should work with this herb because I’ve seen it be helpful for these folks with this particular issue in the course of pregnancy. Well, that may not apply because someone’s biology could be different, or other factors could be going on. Yeah. Right.

Katja (00:21:54):
And then also to say my experience, some people are brandy new, and they don’t have a lot of experience yet. Okay. That doesn’t mean automatically that you can’t trust them. It’s not that you can only trust gray-haired elders, and nobody else has valid things to contribute. Also, you can only trust gray- and purple-haired elders, and nobody else has anything valuable to contribute. You can be fairly new at this and still have… If you are well trained, and throughout your training you were very active in experiencing the things that you were learning. I’m thinking of a specific student we have right now who just tests everything out, and has just started into mentorship, and is so solid. So, so solid and is really good at making analogies, and making things understandable to other people, and often contributes in our student community and stuff to clarify. And this is a person who has not been in practice yet. In practice for themselves and for their friends and their local sort of extended friend group, household, whatever, community but hasn’t had clinical practice yet. Is just starting that process. And so I would hate to say oh, well, you should never listen to anybody who doesn’t have decades of experience because they won’t have anything to contribute. No, this particular person I’m thinking of has a lot to contribute. And actually all of our Clinical Mentorship students, some of them are in private practice now, but whatever. All of them have things that are like their superpower that they’re really good at. And all of them are worth listening to. They do have things to contribute. So, don’t write off new people just because they have a small number of years of experience. We’re looking for nutrient density in their experience. And that’s the end of my sentence.

Investigate Casual References to Tradition

Ryn (00:24:28):
Yeah. And this connects to another source of information that people will cite too, whether explicitly or implicitly, which is tradition. And tradition is also not invalid as a source of information for herbalism, of course. But we can dig a little bit deeper into that. So we can say well, which tradition do you mean? Or whose tradition do you mean? And with that we’re looking for again, it’s basically a reality check that we’re looking for here. So, somebody could be like well, there’s a pretty well-established tradition of working with linden in Western herbalism in particular to help with spasmodic conditions in the heart, and to help to lower blood pressure when it’s driven by a lot of tension, and to help to calm people who are feeling anxious with that tension pattern. Because it’s a relaxant herb, and we can talk about other reasons why it does those things. But yeah, there is a tradition for that, and it is pretty solid. And we can look at that as a reason why we might want to recommend linden to this person who’s in front of me right now, and shows the tension, and has the heart issue, and so on. And so somebody who’s like well yeah, it’s linden. It’s traditional for these concerns. There’s something to it. But there’s another way that people might talk about tradition. They might be like well, this herb is traditionally used in… The way I thought at first was in Anishinaabe herbalism, but that’s not the way they would say it. They would say this is traditionally used in Native American herbalism for syphilis or for whatever else they’re going to go to next. And so when a statement is framed or shaped like that, then that should raise your ears a little bit.

Katja (00:26:13):
Right. Because that person is trying to use traditionally used by Native Americans to… They’re trying to borrow authority from that statement. Okay, y’all. By Native Americans is like saying by humans. There are so many different traditions that are Native American. So, if somebody’s going to claim that it was Native American tradition, first off, does that person have any right to make that claim? Any heritage to make that claim?

Ryn (00:26:53):
Yeah. The contact with the tradition is what we’re talking about more than your bloodline.

Katja (00:26:58):
Yes, yes. And then secondly, Native American is not specific enough. So, when you see traditionally used by Native Americans, that should make you wonder if exploitation is happening. When you see my family line, my Ojibwa family line has always worked with this plant in this way, that’s a really different statement. Yeah.

Ryn (00:27:31):
And this extends other places as well. If somebody says ashwagandha has been used in Ayurvedic tradition for thousands of years to give people energy when they feel tired. Again, that should give you some pause. Because first off, in ancient herbalism there wasn’t a lot of like oh, you just feel tired. Take this herb for energy. There would have been a context and a framework for when and where that herb was appropriate. There would have been a whole set of presentations, and symptoms, and patterns, and things that we would talk about nowadays as energetics, and other manifestations that would say all right, we’re going to try this herb for you. We think it makes sense for what you’re presenting with. It wouldn’t be flattened the way that kind of a statement usually ends up shaped. Especially if that kind of a statement is pointing towards a modern medical diagnosis or an experience of modern life. Like if somebody say this herb has been used, calamus has been used in ancient Ayurvedic traditions for brain fog for thousands of years. Okay, they weren’t talking about brain fog a thousand years ago. They might have spoken about different forms of mental struggle or difficulty or things that the cutting nature of the calamus could help you out with, and could sharpen up your mind, and so on. But that word brain fog, or chronic fatigue, or Type 2 diabetes, or whatever, if there is a tradition that connects to that, there’s a lot of interstitial material between what the tradition was like and what the modern presentation is like. And we can knit these things together. This is part of our work as herbalists who are interested in tradition, who are drawing knowledge from it. But we need to connect those dots.

Katja (00:29:21):
Right. Listen, they knew what diabetes was. They didn’t necessarily call it diabetes. But they knew what cancer was. They knew what a lot of things. They weren’t stupid. Just because it was a long time ago doesn’t mean that they didn’t have knowledge. But they did not operate in the same context that we operate in today. So, that kind of a statement again, it’s exploitive because it’s like stealing authority from a tradition. And usually it’s a tradition that does not belong to the person who’s making the claim. And then it’s out of context or disjunct context between the modern application and the traditional context for it. But sometimes people make these kinds of claims from their own tradition as well. So, I don’t want to just say that well, if the person is blonde hair and blue eyed, and they’re making claims about traditional use of ashwagandha, then you shouldn’t trust them because that’s appropriation. That’s not the only way this works. Sometimes people are exploiting a tradition that they do belong to because it’s profitable.

Ryn (00:30:42):
If some teacher is like I’ve got Western European heritage, and comfrey is an herb that grows in that part of the world. and people have worked with it in different ways for a long time. We’re on solid ground so far. But when they start talking about how traditionally people would take comfrey leaves, and they would make a long, nourishing infusion, and they would drink those to get calcium. Okay, hang on. Ancient people weren’t thinking about calcium. And also on another layer here, comfrey was not an herb that was considered like a standard pot green. Like an herb that you would just throw in with spinach, and amaranth, and goosefoot leaf, and other things. And just whatever green stuff you could grab and was food. And we throw them into the pot, and we cook them up. And then we eat them, and we get nourishment that way. Comfrey wasn’t actually taken that way.

Katja (00:31:32):
Except in desperation.

Ryn (00:31:33):
Except in desperation. And so that person is trying to talk about their preferred preparation of this herb, and they’re trying to connect it to a tradition that doesn’t actually exist.

Katja (00:31:46):
But it is from their own. It would not be appropriation because they themselves were Western European descent, sure.

Ryn (00:31:55):
So, some of that is basically a little bit of – I don’t know – manifesting or a little bit of hoping about what you would like tradition to have been. Rather than digging into historical context and looking at old receipt or recipe books. And being like well, how did people actually work with comfrey 100 years ago, 500 years ago, a thousand years ago? What evidence do we have for that from materia medica books written at those times or archeological studies about remnants of this and people’s teeth enamel and whatever, all that kind of stuff? We can try to piece these things together, but you can’t just gesture towards tradition, and then it happens to look exactly like your preferred way to administer herbs to your friends. And be like there, I’m done.

Katja (00:32:42):
That’s like fantasy or tradition core, like cottage core or whatever. And it’s so easy to grab onto that. So yeah, so whenever you see traditionally used for, or another phrasing is is known to X, Y, Z. Oh, is it known to do that? Who knows that it will do that? Who?

Ryn (00:33:14):
And I mean look, there’s cases where somebody will use that kind of language, or they’ll say things in that way not because they have nothing else to base it on. And so if this is a teacher that you can speak to or you can communicate with in some way, then you should be able to write in and be like well, what do you mean by is known to do this? Who knows that, and how do they know it? And if they have something to stand on, then your teacher should be able to provide an answer to that kind of a question.

Katja (00:33:42):
Actually, one of our students wrote me an email and was like Katja, in this document you wrote is known to blah, blah, blah. And you never say that. What is going on here? Like what do you mean it’s known to blah, blah, blah? And so first off, I was mortified. But yeah, it’s true. I had written that a long time ago. And the reality is that something is known to do something. Well, that is a turn of phrase that people say. It is something that as we try to put a sentence together, that is something you could grab for because it’s something that’s commonly said. Okay. Well, I went back and changed that document because just because something is commonly said doesn’t mean that it’s okay for me to kind of put a cop out in that document. I should put more information than is known to have this particular effect. And so I did. I went back, and I fixed it. And now I’m on the lookout for any other old document that I ever wrote that has is known to in it. And so yeah, it doesn’t automatically mean that it’s evil, bad, appropriation, misinformation, whatever, but it is something that should catch you. And you can program your brain so that when you see that kind of a thing – traditionally used for, is known to, whatever – that that stops you and makes you question is this a reasonable statement? Is this an appropriate statement? Is this a trustworthy statement? And maybe your result is oh, that was a poor choice of grammar, but in fact that statement jives with every other thing that I’ve ever read about this herb. Fine. Okay. Well, now we can complain about grammar, but we don’t have to not trust this person just because they used a questionable formulation in their sentence. Yeah.

Question Herb-Drug Comparisons or Claims of Lost Secrets

Ryn (00:35:38):
So, we’ve kind of started with some yellow flags, I guess. Things that might raise your eyebrows or your ears a little bit, but they’re not definitively bad or great. But let’s get into some cases that are a little more clear-cut. Let’s start with some red flags for things that an herbalist may claim or may put out there to you. So, one of the reddest flags around is things like oh, this herb is Amish ibuprofen. Or oh hey, berberine is nature’s Ozempic. And you can get that from drinking goldenseal tea. Okay. So, what is the problem with a claim like that? And I mean, we should have an answer aside from that’s ridiculous, or that’s too superficial, or that’s just marketing speak to catch people’s attention. All those things are true, but let’s get into it a little further. What is the problem with saying valerian is herbal valium? Okay.

Katja (00:36:40):
Well, first off, it’s not.

Ryn (00:36:42):
And what do you mean by it’s not? Well, it’s not the same chemistry in that particular example. Willow is not Amish ibuprofen because again, very different chemistry going on but also different potency. It’s a different thing. An herb is not a drug.

(00:36:57):
And you can refer back to, I think it was episode 101. I think that’s the one it was, about how herbs are different from drugs because there are several different critical facets between the way each of them is constituted. An herb has many different chemicals in it, and many of them are going to be active or synergistic. Whereas the sort of ideal drug is one chemical over and over again. Many of that molecule, but it’s all the same one. And other facets there will be big differences between how they enter the body, how they operate inside of the body, what kind of effect they can have, what side effects they can have, and so on.

Katja (00:37:37):
Even just sort of thinking about that Valium example, Valium will knock everybody out. It is really strong, and it will overpower whatever the body’s doing. Valerian doesn’t work the same way in all people because there are energetic interactions going on. So, a person who is a very fiery, hot, high-tempered person is going to have a different reaction than a person who is cold, sedate, and kind of can’t quite get everything firing in the brain, like having like some brain fog sort of situation. These two people will have different reactions to valerian. And it’s not because you’ve certainly heard oh, 10% of people have an inverse reaction to valerian. I have absolutely said that in my life, in my young herbalist life, when that was the best advice that was going around. And nobody had yet sat down and said hold on a second. Let’s think about this energetically. What’s really going on here? Well okay, it’s not 10% of the people will have an inverse reaction. It is hey, this is logical if you look at the energetics of the plant, that a cold person and a hot person just simply are going to respond to this plant differently.

Ryn (00:39:02):
This warming plant.

Katja (00:39:03):
Right. Because this plant is warming. So, the people who feel relief from it are going to be the people in that brain fog cold category. Whereas the people who have the 10% of people have the inverse reaction. Well, it’s going to be bigger because more than 10% of the people run hot. All right. But they’re not having an inverse reaction. They are having a direct reaction to being warmed up more than they already were. So, they’re not like oh, it made them agitated for some weird reason. No, it made them agitated because they were already hot and stimulated, hot blooded, hot tempered, whatever and stimulated. And then we gave them an herb that warmed them up further. And so that was the response that they had. Okay. But if you give those two people Valium, they will not have these two different responses. Yeah.

Ryn (00:40:00):
Which is one of the reasons why conventional medicine tends to prefer these agents because they feel that they’re more predictable. Yeah. Okay. So yeah. So statements like that, a direct comparison between an herb and a drug, those should definitely be a red flag for you. Because even if you’re just using that to catch attention, there’s so many misconceptions that are bound up in a framing like that, that I think that it’s counterproductive from the very get go.

Katja (00:40:29):
And also when we think about Amish ibuprofen or Native American whatever, insert drug name here.

Ryn (00:40:41):
Cherokee penicillin, whatever.

Katja (00:40:42):
Yes, exactly. Whenever they’re doing that again, that is stealing authority from a group. So, in the case of Amish people, that’s stealing the authority from the perception that this is a group of people who live a quotey mark natural life and supposedly don’t ever get sick, although that’s not actually true. Studies on Amish populations are in fact that they get sick possibly more often than the baseline population. But again, that is not necessarily about their herbs, or not about their herbs, or about their way of life, or whatever else. Although it might be, whatever. That topic is not for this podcast. But the point is that that kind of a statement is stealing from the perception that people have about a particular group of people. And so not only is it inaccurate. But again, it is like instead of working through your personal integrity and allowing that to be your authority. Like I’m really putting big, nasty quote marks around authority because I kind of don’t love that word. Instead of speaking from your experience and your integrity, you are trying to position yourself as an authority who should be believed because they’re in a position of authority/power. And those two framings are really different. We want the integrity one. We do not want the authority one.

Ryn (00:42:25):
Here’s another way that this might turn up, which is here we have found for you the lost secrets of nature medicine. These are things that people used to know. Or maybe somebody far away from your life experience, somebody over there, they know about it. But they’ve been hidden from you, or they’ve been concealed from you.

Katja (00:42:52):
Or stolen from you.

Ryn (00:42:53):
By nefarious actors, right. And this is usually connected to the drug comparison because again, it’s like well, you don’t need those drugs. You don’t need modern medicine in any way, ever, in any context, because natural medicine and herbalism has everything that anybody could ever require. And also I’m going to provide that to you in my book, in my course, in my podcast episode, in my whatever else. And that’s why you should trust me because I have secrets, and I’m going to sell them to you.

Katja (00:43:22):
There are no secrets, y’all. There are no secrets. There’s just stuff you don’t know yet, but there’s no secrets. Oh boy. And they’re not lost either because nowhere on earth are these things dead. Even in the United States, yes, herbalism fell out of fashion among a particular socioeconomic group.

Ryn (00:43:45):
For a few decades.

Katja (00:43:47):
For a few decades. And also herbalism, there were some regulations put in that made it not legal to practice in the same way that they used to practice. But even in the United States, herbalism didn’t die out. It’s just that it was not the preference of the middle and upper classes anymore. And so when people imply these lost secrets, well, that’s just bad history. You just don’t know history. But it isn’t because they don’t know history. It’s because that’s good marketing. That gets across to people.

Suspect Hype, Over-Promising, & Overgeneralizing

Ryn (00:44:35):
Yeah. And this often comes along in another way too, which is really a matter of hype or a matter of over-promising or overgeneralizing. So, that can sound like this herb or this special formula will fix everything for everyone. And sometimes that’s really just left there. This is an amazing thing. It’s so fantastic. Everybody should take it. You’re going to feel incredible. It’s going to transform your life. And there’s no real meat there. There’s no real content to that claim other than this is good, trust me. But other times it’s presented like well, there’s one underlying problem for basically every health problem that people have got. And maybe we call it parasites, or heavy metal contamination, or EMF exposure, or stealth viruses, or whatever somebody’s pet concern is or pet issue is. It’s really common for somebody to take that, and then to generalize it, and be like everybody has this issue. I don’t know. Everybody has gluten sensitivity. Everybody has mineral deficiency. Whatever it is. Even the ones that we like, and that we often talk about because we find them relevant, it’s not going to be the answer for everybody who’s out there. This is something that every practitioner needs to discover in the course of their work. If you have pet theories, if you have pet approaches that you find really reliable and very successful, that’s good. But you learn more when you run into the cases where you tried that, tried it for real, and it didn’t help the way you hoped.

Katja (00:46:10):
Yeah. Listen, every body is different. Every body is different. And there are some things that we can generalize on. We can look generally at diet and say, hmm, people just don’t eat as many vegetables. People just don’t this or that or whatever. Fine. But that is not the answer to everything.

Ryn (00:46:34):
Even if we broaden out and get all of our pillars: food, sleep, movement, stress mitigation, community support, right? Somebody could have all of those really dialed in and still have a genetic disorder that’s causing them a significant health problem. That’s real. That happens. We love natural methods of healing. We are holistic health educators. We tell you every time we do an episode, right? But there are things that are beyond what our tools and methods can do. And those are cases where what we try to say is what is the portion that we can help out with? What is the amount of support that our methods can provide in concert with others? With conventional medicine, with acupuncture, with whatever it is that does the rest of the job.

Katja (00:47:17):
I think that dovetails into the lost secrets thing too, in that when we’re thinking about history and how people are different today than we were in the past and whatever, that must be the answer. First off, a lot of people just don’t know a lot about history. And we can’t kind of look in broad terms through history either because which history are we looking at? A history where there was a lot of famine. A history where people lived in an area of abundance or a time of abundance. A history where there was a lot of exploitation. I’m thinking about the industrial slums in the late 1800s, early 1900s. Let me tell you, nutrition was not good there.

Ryn (00:48:10):
I mean, or a period of time when the dominant medical theories of the day were doing harm to the people they were trying to help.

Katja (00:48:16):
Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So looking back, it doesn’t mean that we can’t learn anything from history, for sure. We can. And it doesn’t mean that we can’t make comparisons to history. But we need to be more savvy and nuanced about it. And that includes these ideas of oh, if we just fix this thing of this problem of modernity, it will fix everyone’s problem. That can’t always work because some people’s problems are coming from other factors. And the flip side of that is medical technology can’t fix problems. Nature will solve all your problems for you. Again, looking back in history, today we see natural medicine as something completely different and separate from conventional medicine. But if we look at human health, and the history of human health, and the history of trying to keep humans alive and healthy, it’s all on history. That dissension about herbalism and conventional medicine specifically is quite recent and also localized. It is not true in every country, but it is true in the United States. But throughout the history of trying to keep people alive, there have often been agreements, disagreements. Some of them had to do with personality more than science. Some of them really came down to I hate that guy. And some of those stories are really fun and interesting. But a lot of history or a lot of health and medical science was stymied by personalities literally of I hate that guy. And I’m thinking about Robert Koch and Louis Pasteur in particular, but there are so many examples of that throughout history. And so recognizing that developments in terms of surgery, surgery is not new. Surgery is prehistoric. But developments in all these aspects that we now call conventional medicine, separating them from herbalism and foundational health – like nutrition, and better sleep, and stress management, stuff like that – is really, really new. But historically all of this was just how do we keep people alive? And then petty squabbles between people with personalities. So, when people are talking about you don’t need that drug because conventional medicine is evil, and nature’s lost secrets will cure you. Okay. Well, that drug may or may not be appropriate for you, your body, your situation, your time in life, your whatever.

Ryn (00:51:38):
It may be over-prescribed. It may be heavily monetized. There may be bad reasons why these things are prevalent in the society. All of that can be true at the same time, and yet.

Katja (00:51:46):
All that can be true. And yet, it isn’t that there are these lost secrets versus the evil pharmaceutical whatever. It is that there’s a lot of tools, and sometimes throughout history, some people fight about them. And so sure, I can say, for example, that if I’m working with kids with an ear infection, well, antibiotics are frequently not actually the best approach because frequently the problems are not bacterial. And so there are other approaches that are going to work better. Now as an herbalist it’s not legal for me to tell somebody don’t take antibiotics. Because that would be practicing medicine without a license, which I do not do. I could have an opinion that I’ve got solutions that are probably going to work better than an antibiotic. But it’s never legal for me to tell somebody not to take an antibiotic. But it is fine for me to work with somebody who’s dealing with chronic ear infections in their kids. And say well, why don’t we try these strategies to see if we can prevent the next ear infection and see if we can prevent you having to deal with this problem again? And so it’s not bad to say looking at all the tools we have available to us, for this particular problem I think this tool is ideal. For that problem a different tool might be better. That’s okay. But this sort of idea of only the natural way is right, and the lost secrets of nature will cure you. That’s the flag.

Ryn (00:53:32):
Yeah. And this is a polarizing kind of a statement. It’s like putting things into camps and saying, I’m over here in this camp, and that means I reject things that are over on that other one. This is also with an element of fear mongering and an element of conspiracy that usually arises. And so those can start to sound like well, the government doesn’t want you to know about this cheap, available herb that can solve all your problems, and it’s going to be better for you than Prozac. Or big pharma is hiding the truth about the efficacy of St. John’s wort because they want to sell more Prozac. And honestly, I’m at a place now where I think that big pharma doesn’t really think about us.

Katja (00:54:09):
They do think about money. They want to make money, true. Although that’s at the high level of administration. I think individual scientists working for pharmaceutical companies just want to help people.

Ryn (00:54:21):
Yeah, by and large. Or just to have a job and get to their day, whatever. Humans being humans all the way down. But you can see the way that going from there are things that have been secret or that knowledge that used to exist and has been hidden. And there are things that can solve any health problem that exists out there without turning to modern medicine. That leads in this direction of being like they, capital T, they is trying to hide it from you. And it’s a conspiracy. And that pushes people further and further in that direction.

Katja (00:54:56):
There have been times through history where capital T, they have had some nefarious whatever. I’m thinking about the 1920s with the foundation of the American Medical Association, and the Flexner Report, and trying to put herbal universities out of business. And okay, those things happened. That was largely about profit and not about hiding things from you. It was really just about how do we position ourselves in the marketplace? So okay, I don’t want to say things like this have never happened. But the thing is that if you are teaching something as an herbalist, you don’t need that fear mongering. And so even if you are going to teach about some historical thing that did happen, it doesn’t need to be this polarizing statement of big pharma is hiding the truth. You know what? Just say what you got to say about when it works and when it doesn’t work.

Ryn (00:56:01):
Yeah. And I mean more – I don’t know – serious, it can be counterproductive. It can be counter helpful to people who may need more support. And that can include situations where like yeah, we could construct a complete herbal protocol, diet plan, and habit set for this individual, a total regimen for them that would effectively resolve their elevated blood pressure and their bad cholesterol numbers. We can feel very confident about that. But maybe this is a person who isn’t able right now to expend the time, energy, money, and effort to change their habits in all of those ways and to sustain that. And it may be that while they learn those skills, which can take some time, that it does make sense for them to take this or that medication. And so we’re better able to serve people in the real world as they actually exist, as they actually live if we don’t restrict ourselves by saying none of those methods are ever good. None of those methods are ever, ever appropriate.

Katja (00:57:10):
Sometimes those methods are the only thing that’s accessible to a particular individual. Yeah.

Avoid Gurus & Those Who Break the Law

Ryn (00:57:17):
Okay. So all of this stuff also tends to travel with something that we call the guru problem or the cult of personality. Which is where somebody is putting themselves out there and saying I have the lost secrets. I can tell you about what they are conspiring against you with. And we’ve got all of these herbs that are better than drugs and are going to solve all your problems. And I’ve got all the information you need. So trust me, don’t listen to anybody else. You don’t need to. I have all the answers for you. And whether it’s that explicit or not, that lean or that implication is present in a lot of these kinds of offerings or claims.

Katja (00:58:00):
Yeah. The reality is, okay, well, don’t be a guru. And we did a whole podcast episode about that too, How to Not be a Guru, but I never know the number of the podcasts.

Ryn (00:58:11):
Yeah, we’ll have to put that in the show notes.

Katja (00:58:13):
Ryn will know that one. I don’t know how he does that. Anyway, the thing is that you should have multiple teachers. Even if you are out there, and you see some information and it turns out to be bad. And you evaluate it, and you say yeah no, that’s not actually useful information. That’s still an important exercise for you. And so even if you find the perfect teacher who is exactly aligned with all your everything, it’s still good to hear things from other perspectives because it is good to have your ideas challenged and pushed against. And it is good to let new information in, and evaluate that, and practice evaluating it, and say how does that change what I think right now? How does that expand what I’m thinking right now, or how does that contradict what I’m thinking right now? And is that expansion or contradiction valid?” And even if it isn’t valid, it may make you think of new things. And so that experience is worthwhile. And even if it is hard to find good teachers to add into your collection or whatever, it’s still worth doing because that strengthens, and complements, and expands your knowledge. Yeah.

Ryn (00:59:40):
Yeah. All right. One last sort of red flag category for behaviors from people who want to offer information is basically breaking some laws that exist about what one can say and what one can do in the alternative health space or in the herbalism space. So, one big bucket here is what falls under the idea of practicing medicine without a license. And just to be clear, there is a little bit of difference here between I’m writing a blog, or I’m teaching a class versus I’m speaking to an individual person. So, there are some things that you can get away with, legally speaking, if you’re just like well, I’m at a conference, and I’m doing a class. And I’m saying look, nobody should ever take a statin. You don’t need to. You could just take hibiscus instead. It’s a natural statin. It’ll do the job. It’s fine.

Katja (01:00:32):
That’s not advice.

Ryn (01:00:34):
Yeah.

Katja (01:00:34):
That was an example. That was not advice.

Ryn (01:00:39):
Right. People can get away with that. They’re not going to get in trouble. If somebody goes and speaks to an individual person and says you should stop taking your statin, and you should just drink hibiscus tea every day instead. Now they have absolutely crossed that line because it’s specific advice to an individual. And now this qualifies as practicing medicine without a license. Because it is telling them to stop doing something that a doctor has prescribed, and because they’re saying that this herb can do the same job or perform the same function.

Katja (01:01:09):
Like making a medical claim.

Ryn (01:01:11):
Making a medical claim. Making a claim about a medical condition.

Katja (01:01:16):
Right. And so again, the purpose here is people get so frustrated that this law even exists. In this law is also that we’re not allowed to say that something will treat a disease or cure a disease.

Ryn (01:01:33):
Or prevent.

Katja (01:01:35):
Or prevent a disease, right? And we’re not allowed to diagnose diseases. So, this is all like a package here. Not saying stop taking that drug and take this herb instead. And then this herb will treat, or cure, or prevent your diseases, whatever. So, people get frustrated about that and angry. Like why do we have this kind of law? This is a stupid law. But I don’t think it is. First of all, it is helpful to just not step on the toes of other professionals. Actually, it is helpful to not be in an antagonistic relationship with your client’s other practitioners. It is always better to be in a collaborative relationship with your client’s other practitioners. So, that’s not why they made this law, but the reality is it is better. You will have better results if you are coming from a place of collaboration than if you are coming from a place of antagonization. So, that’s good. But also we do not treat, or cure, or prevent diseases as herbalists. We actually do not do it. And there’s a little bit of hair splitting here, but I think it’s very important hair splitting, and it’s worth doing. That a disease is a name. A diagnosis is a name. It is a label. It is a descriptive term that a particular group of people practicing a particular discipline use to describe what they see in a person.

(01:03:17):
Just like however many hundred years ago they didn’t call diabetes diabetes. They called it something different. It’s the same. Yes, we can say this collection of symptoms. We can describe it in our language as herbalists. We can talk about the cause in our language as herbalists. It will be a different perspective than the way that medical science describes it. Yes, we are talking about the same fundamental thing, but we are looking at different factors and prioritizing different factors in different ways. If it’s an infectious disease, if somebody has the measles, okay, well, the factor is they were exposed to measles. And measles is a really strong germ, and you in fact will get sick if you get exposed to measles and haven’t been vaccinated. That’s pretty hard to avoid. Okay. But if we’re really talking about an inflammatory disease, or a chronic illness, or something like that, which is the majority of work that herbalists do today especially. Then we are prioritizing different factors simply because our tools work differently. And those are the factors where we can have the most influence. So, I don’t even have a problem with adhering to the law about not treating or curing diseases because that’s like saying oh, well I’m not… They’re two different systems.

(01:04:51):
But whether I have a problem with it, or whether I don’t have a problem with it, it is still the law. And when you are getting information, and somebody is flagrantly breaking that law, this is not a hidden law. It is not an unknown law. It has been the law for a lot of years, more than 20 years. And so if somebody is just breaking it, that doesn’t make them a cool rebel. It kind of means they don’t actually understand what herbalism is. It kind of means that they’re not solid enough in their own discipline, in their own practice to understand what we’re really doing here. And they can only function inside the terms of a different practice. Then all you’re really doing is substituting herbs for pharmaceuticals and being like oh no, just take this instead. And that’s not actually the approach that we’re trying to make. So, it’s kind of like yeah, maybe they’re trying to be a rebel and cool and present themselves as bucking the system. Well, that doesn’t impress me. But also it’s admitting that they’re really not very good at our own system that we’re trying to work in.

Ryn (01:06:16):
Let us practice herbalism instead of practicing medicine without a license.

Katja (01:06:19):
Yes.

Ryn (01:06:22):
Yes. All right. So yeah, that’s a pretty big flag. Another one here, last one on this particular subtopic is going to be when people are telling and selling. And so that would mean that this person is both offering information and also products, remedies. They have a consulting practice. They have a teaching business, or practice, or whatever. And they’re also selling tincture blends, formulas, tea mixtures, whatever the preparation is. So, this is not something that you should do. And this is coming more from the product side of things in the sense that the FDA and some other authorities can look at the whole context of everything that you do in the world. And they can be like well, you sell this product. And even if you’re following the rules about what you’re allowed to put on the label, and what you’re allowed to call it and other things like that. Over here on this other page of your same website you’re talking about that formula or just talking about the ingredients in that formula and saying that they can cure this, and they can fix that, and they can solve all these problems again, in that kind of medical terminology and in that framework. And so when you do those things, then they’re saying okay, these actually constitute claims about your product. And the way that they look at that, and the way that there are connections drawn between the literal product, and the box that comes in, and the label that’s on it, or the sales page that you’ve got about it, and your TikTok account.

Katja (01:08:01):
Your marketing materials.

Ryn (01:08:02):
Your YouTube video, your whatever else, those things are seen as connected because they are. Come on.

Katja (01:08:08):
Because they are, because they are. And then what they’re saying is that you’re making claims about a medical product. Because you’re making these claims, it is clear that you are intending this to be a medical product. But none of those claims have been tested, and therefore this is a fraud that you’re perpetrating. And so people get mad about this too. And also you can check out the podcast episode, Making Peace with GMP and the FDA, something like that for a lot more information about this law and why it’s actually not a bad law. It helps us as herbalists. It actually protects us and helps legitimize us. But it does make people mad because they feel like I should be able to tell people. But the thing is that most of the time when I see product accounts on the internet making claims about their products, they’re not actually very solid claims. And the reality is that being a product maker is a full-time job. And being a teacher is a full-time job. You can’t really do two full-time jobs. And so what ends up happening is that the quality of teaching isn’t fantastic. And even if we’re just saying oh, oops, they just made a mistake or whatever. Okay, but that looks like you are trying to make a promise to somebody to get their money, and that promise wasn’t true. We don’t allow that about pillows, or children’s toys, or mattresses, or cars. Why would we allow that for herbal products, something that you’re going to put in your mouth? You’re going to consume this. There should be basic safety regulations in place, and there are. But when people are not following the safety regulations, whether that’s about cleanliness in the location that they prepared it, or whether it’s about how they talk about their product. And listen, there are very popular accounts that do this. And there are plenty of teachers who also make products and sell them. But it’s kind of counterproductive to creating this legitimacy in the consumer base. A lot of people feel like well, if I can’t teach and sell a product, I won’t be able to make enough money. But that is not actually true. You totally can survive, and make an income, and sustain yourself without breaking those regulations. And so I look for that in a person who is sharing information on the internet.

The More Context, The Better, Including Contraindications

Ryn (01:10:57):
Yeah. Okay. But it’s not all doom and gloom. So, let’s look at some green flags. So, these are indicators that the person and their writing, or their teaching, or their class, or whatever is more reliable, more trustworthy. And so we start with the more context that is given for claims that are made or statements that are made about herbs and what they can do, the better. So, if someone is saying yeah, this herb can be really helpful here but not so much over there. Not in that situation, not in that case, not in that type of individual, not for that variant of the name of this problem that we’re describing. The more context given in that sense, the more trusty it is. Or if the person says well, I found this herb to be helpful in these kinds of cases in these ways. Here’s the whole context about how we were working with it. And that can include things like these were the energetic indications that made me want to choose that plant. These were the herbal action-based reasons that I was choosing it. That’s better than well, because they had this disease, or because they had this symptom, I gave this herb, or I recommended this herb. Better to say they had this symptom. We want this action. The herb has this action. There’s the whole line of thought. There’s the whole thread connecting them all together.

Katja (01:12:27):
And specifically here, that’s important for many, many reasons. But I think the most important one when we’re thinking about evaluating whether or not information is useful and good is that just because two people have the same diagnosis, the same named condition, does not mean they have the same symptoms. And even if they have a lot of similarities, they don’t have the same body. And so when we’re choosing herbs, we have to consider their constitution. Sure, they have rheumatoid arthritis right now, but what else is going on in their body? Are they swollen in the joints but typically dehydrated? Or are they too much moisture everywhere in the body with a lot of stagnation? That’s going to change the way we would approach our work as herbalists, even though they both have the same name. They both have the same diagnosis name. So, when we’re thinking about these claims, it’s not even about like oh, Katja and Ryn said they’re not doing it right if they don’t give this information. Or if they say this herb is for rheumatoid arthritis, then supposedly I’m not supposed to trust them. No, it’s because you don’t actually have enough information to act on what you heard. And so that’s why these context ideas are really important. Because if you just hear cayenne for rheumatoid arthritis, that doesn’t give you enough information to be able to take action yet. You’ve got to have more context to go on.

Ryn (01:14:14):
Yeah. And it helps a lot in terms of confidence building for us when we see people who include things like contraindications or warnings about interactions. So yeah, cayenne can improve blood flow to the heart muscle itself, and it can be beneficial for a number of different cardiovascular problems because of that. But cayenne does have some contraindications, especially if we’re talking about taking it in significant doses every day for a long period of time, because it’s an extremely fiery, hot herb. And so it’s not going to make sense for somebody who’s already running really hot and dry. And it can have a decent blood thinning effect if you take enough of it, and you take it for long enough at a stretch. And so if that person is also on two or three blood thinning medications at the same time, that’s probably not the herb that I’m going to choose in that situation. So, because those realities of context exist in the world where people actually live, they should also exist in the teaching or the discussion of the herb when we’re raising ideas about what we can do with it or how we can help people with it. Yeah. That specificity should also include ideally, ideally things like well, what format are we going to take the herb in? What dose are we going to take it in? How frequently are we going to take it each day, and for what kind of duration? How many days at a stretch are we going to take it? These I put all under the rubric of people do not consume the names of herbs. Because so often when it’s like on the internet especially, or even in classes it’ll be like hey, what do y’all like to offer for this symptom or for this health problem? And then people will just name plants. We’ve shared like one bit of information. It’s not enough to do anything with.

Katja (01:15:59):
It’s not actionable. Yeah.

Ryn (01:16:01):
If somebody says that garlic is good for high blood pressure, well, how do you take the garlic? How much garlic do you need? Who is the garlic best for, and who is it not very helpful for? All those things make a huge difference in the real world, the real instantiation of what we do with it and whether it actually helps or not. Yeah.

Katja (01:16:23):
So, this is so common in Facebook health groups or whatever where somebody will ask a question, and then a million people will just be answering with just the names of herbs. Well, don’t even bother. If you are like oh, I guess I could research every single one of these names of herbs that people are saying. But it’s kind of like there’s just no context for you to even be able to evaluate if that’s a reasonable suggestion or not. So, what you really are looking for is the person who says okay, well, for that situation there’s a few different factors we need to consider. It might be this way, or it might be that way. And if it were this way, then I would be looking at these sorts of suggestions. And if it were that way, I would be looking at those sorts of suggestions.

Ryn (01:17:15):
Or even if it’s more limited. Just like well, I was in a situation kind of like that, and I took it this way. I took it this often. This is some detail about my pattern of symptoms that were manifesting at the time, and my constitution, and also what flavors I like best. That’s good information. That’s something that you can actually build on.

Katja (01:17:34):
Right, because then you can decide how much of that applies to your body and your situation.

Beware Exaggerated Warnings & People Monetizing Only Quick Soundbites

Ryn (01:17:39):
Yeah. Totally. Right. And so it also keeps it grounded in reality that way. It’s like so herbs are fantastic. We love them. There are some limitations to them. Okay. Let’s talk about what those are and what they look like. That’s very different from being like yeah, herbs are amazing, and they’re incredibly powerful. But also they might kill you if you take them with the wrong over the counter medication. That’s going too far in, I guess, the other direction or some other direction.

Katja (01:18:05):
Yeah. Well, and I think that again is one of those trying to steal authority by looking like you are the arbiter of knowledge of what is dangerous.

Ryn (01:18:19):
Ginger shouldn’t be taken in pregnancy because it could put you at risk of a spontaneous abortion. Okay, no, no. And also no. That’s not realistic. That’s not grounded in reality. That’s grounded in several different layers of theoretical concern. In this particular instance if you’re not familiar, this is rooted in people looking at anything that can serve as an emmenagogue and bring on menstruation when it’s slow and sluggish. And being like well, that must also be an abortifacient. And ignoring the fact that ginger is completely routine and extremely reliable for nausea during pregnancy and other facets like that. And is in no way going to put somebody at risk of spontaneous menstrual cramps, or uterine spasms, or whatever else. It’s way, way out there.

Katja (01:19:03):
Yeah, yeah. So, really kind of thinking like there are things that you shouldn’t combine with a common over-the-counter drug. I’m thinking like St. John’s wort and Tylenol. Yeah, okay, that’s not a good idea. Or even St. John’s wort and organ rejection drugs. Well, they’re not common over-the-counter drugs, but that’s also a terrible idea or St. John’s wort and psychiatric medications. But that doesn’t mean that St. John’s wort is dangerous in all situations. And it also doesn’t mean that we need to set our hair on fire about that situation. It’s just information that you should have. So, somebody trying to get attention by making something sound scary is different than somebody who’s just giving you clear context.

Ryn (01:19:51):
Right. Yeah. And I mean, a lot of times what happens there is that somebody has kind of adopted a statement out of some scientific context and taken it out of its scientific context. And that can happen like oh, you should never ever take passionflower if you’re also taking a benzodiazepine drug because passionflower has constituents that bind to the benzodiazepine receptor. And therefore when you take that with that drug, it’s going to have this additive effect, and it’s going to make you super drowsy. And you’re going to sleep for three days, or you’re going to crash your car while you drive home, or something else is going to happen like that. So, that’s based on some science. There are constituents in those herbs that do bind to those receptors in the brain. But they don’t do it at anything approaching the strength of the drug. And they’re not going to have the kind of additive effects that you would get between two drugs. They’re porting over that concept from drug-drug interactions, and now applying it to herb-drug interactions, and not paying attention to the potency of those chemicals in that plant. The concentration of those chemicals in that plant, maybe they’re there, but there’s not really much of them. And when you drink a cup of tea, the exposure you get is too small to really matter in this particular way. So, this goes into kind of the other main topic we wanted to get to today, which is about how do we analyze scientific information about plants?

Katja (01:21:20):
Before we jump to that though, I do want to kind of wrap up that green flag segment with a little reality check though. Because there are lots of people, especially on social media, who are spewing complete nonsense, even if they look like somebody you could trust, even if they sound like somebody you can trust. And there are a lot of people on the internet who do have a lot of experience, and are saying things that are reasonable. But in a social media environment where you have 60 seconds, 30 seconds. Maybe it’s TikTok, and you have a couple of minutes to try to get some information across, and your full-time job is not influencer. Then you may not include the complete context of every single thing in every single post. So, I do want to leave space for good teachers, good people to learn from, to put a post out there that does just say hey, this helps a lot with this thing, because it’s a short form whatever. And so if a person is always only saying those things, and they are an influencer or whatever, and they are monetizing their who knows what, we’re stacking up the flags here. Whereas if a person sometimes takes more time to be more in depth about some context. And other times does a quick Instagram story or whatever that is boy, I love my ground ivy. It really beat my headache today. Or whatever they happen to say. That’s something that I could envision saying. So okay. Just because they did that once or a couple times in a short medium doesn’t immediately rule out their validity as somebody to learn from. So, we’re trying to look at their body of work overall and also cut them a little slack for the reality that it is hard to get all the context into a 30-second video or a 60-second video. Okay, that is true. And that’s why we want to look at all their different sources, like longer form sources to see okay, but when they do have the time, do they say these things? When they do have this space to expand, are they including the things that I want to be hearing from a teacher?

Critically Evaluate Scientific Research

Ryn (01:24:03):
Yeah. So some of the things that we’re talking about have some echoes that are going to turn up when we’re looking at scientific sources of information, like an article about a study or a review article that draws together information for multiple studies and papers and things like that. So, the first thing we want to say here is that there may not be a study for everything that you’re interested in, right?

Katja (01:24:25):
There definitely won’t be. Yeah.

Ryn (01:24:28):
Yeah. Not every connection between an herb and a health problem, or some effect in the body, or whatever else has already been investigated. Or not investigated in the way that you would hope, which we’re going to outline more as we go along.

Katja (01:24:44):
Yeah. That’s a big factor. They may have investigated it, but their purpose for investigating it is not the same as your purpose for investigating it. So, the results might not be accessible to you. Yeah. Even if you can read them, they might not be actionable for you. Yeah.

Ryn (01:24:59):
Yeah. This does also, like what we’re about to say here, it does also apply to things that are not just in PubMed or some other internet repository of scientific data. If there’s a book, and it has a bunch of claims that are apparently backed up by citations to scientific information, then that still deserves a little bit of a critical eye. Remember that publishing companies publish books because they hope to sell them. This is a bigger motivator than to educate the populace.

Katja (01:25:34):
That’s in particular true in our industry as herbalists. They are not out there saying well, we’re only going to publish books by good herbalists. No, they will publish any book they think they can sell.

Ryn (01:25:51):
So I mean, even the ones that are not written by AI, they do still need to be vetted and investigated. And you look at them not with scorn but with curiosity.

Katja (01:26:00):
Yeah, yeah. And the sad thing is that there are some books out there that are worth writing that won’t get written because a publisher would say that wouldn’t sell enough copies to make a profit.

Ryn (01:26:13):
That’s true.

Katja (01:26:14):
Yeah. But I can think about some herbalists that I’m like man, I would love their book. But it won’t ever get written maybe because they don’t have the time, but also because they don’t have the publishing contract that would pay them to take the time to write it, whatever.

Ryn (01:26:30):
Yeah. But let’s think about scientific articles, the things that get published in some journal somewhere. And then the most common way for you to find them is you’re doing a search in Google Scholar, or at the PubMed website, or some resource like that. Okay. So, you found a paper that you find interesting. The first question to ask is even if this paper is good, and I’m not sure it is yet. But even if it is good, does it apply to anything that I can actually do in the way that I practice as an herbalist? So, there’s a few different ways that we can try to assess this. And the first one is like, does the headline about the paper, like maybe you saw that from EurekAlert, or Science Daily, or some other aggregator about news, about science, like new publications. And they make a little article that says these people at this university were studying this thing, and they found some results. And they have a little short article about it. So, there’s that. There’s that little article, there’s that little article’s headline. Polyphenols from cacao have been shown to reduce blood pressure, therefore eat as much chocolate as you want. No, hang on. Right? So, there’s the headline. There’s the actual paper itself. There’s the abstract of that paper. And then there’s the full text of that paper, especially the materials and methods sections. Because that is what did we work with and what work did we do with it? And that’s really where your attention should go most deeply.

Katja (01:28:03):
Right. Remember that, and I feel like this is really important, and that people have really forgotten this or maybe didn’t even ever know it. But as papers have become more mainstream and more accessible that anybody can read one, I see that the general feeling about a paper is that it is in and of itself proof of a truth. And that is not what a scientific paper is. A scientific paper is a report about an experiment that was done for the purpose of encouraging other people to also do the experiment and see if they get the same results. So that as a community, the scientific community can begin to get enough data together to determine whether or not something is real. Just one paper does not prove that something is real yet because they could have had some kind of outlier. They could have had some kind of contamination. They could have had some thing that somebody else would have done differently, whatever. So, really recognize that the purpose of any one study – and a meta review we’ll put aside – like an individual study, the purpose of any individual study is here’s some data. We need more. Who wants to add to my pile of data by rerunning my experiment? And when you remember that that’s the purpose of a study, then studies are no longer written in stone. And they should never have been written in stone. Science doesn’t look at a study as written in stone. But I feel like mainstream people reading a study do look at that and say well, this is written in stone. This is now obviously the truth.

Ryn (01:30:06):
Yeah. But the process of being like okay, we did this experiment. It had all these details to it about what we applied, and how we did it, and so on. And then kind of distilling that down into here’s the real short report on what we did. Down from there into the title of the paper or the headline of the little article about the paper. You can see where information gets lost along the way.

Katja (01:30:31):
Like that telephone game.

Ryn (01:30:33):
Yeah. Yeah. One real practical way this turns up a lot in the context of herbalism especially is that maybe the paper sounds great, really interesting. But it turns out when you look closely that it was actually not a study about the herb. It was a study about some super-concentrated special extract of that herb that you can’t actually make at home. So, it’s not about herbal tea. It’s about a super-critical CO2 extract that has concentrated all the fat-soluble components of this herb. And when you take this one capsule that they produced for their study, it would be the equivalent of consuming like 20 pounds of the herb material itself. So, there’s a gap there between what they were working with and what you have to work with or what you can give to somebody to work with or recommend to them. It doesn’t mean such a study is useless. It can still tell us something interesting. That’s fine.

Katja (01:31:33):
I mean it tells us stuff about the product that they…

Ryn (01:31:35):
It tells us something about that particular preparation, that particular extract, or concentrate, or whatever. And if we have access to that, if that is a commercial entity that exists, okay, cool. Maybe that can be part of my recommendation set for somebody who runs into that same issue. Okay. But just being aware of that difference between here is quote a study on spearmint, or saw palmetto, or kelp, or whatever. Versus oh, that was actually a study on a specialized extract of one of those things. Just being aware of that difference and looking out for it when you see this kind of information gets you pretty far ahead of a lot of folks.

Katja (01:32:15):
The problem with that specific thing and why this is so important for you to be aware of is because the headline will not say super-concentrated extract PS-128 found to help Alzheimer’s patients in this way. It will say ginkgo helps Alzheimer’s patients in this way. Oh wait, no, that’s not the same thing.

Ryn (01:32:42):
Right, right. Yeah. And I mean to some extent that depends on where this is being reported. So for instance, there could be a study that was done on an extract of ashwagandha. And in some publications it’s going to be headlined ashwagandha relieves stress symptoms in postmenopausal women. And then in some industry publication it’s going to say KSM-66 circle R was shown to relieve symptoms of anxiety in postmenopausal women. Because the people reading that industry publication know what KSM-66 is. They know that this is a branded extract from ashwagandha made by these companies that you can buy and put into your supplements. Okay. So, context dependent is going to apply here as well. Yeah. So, just like the study may have been done on a specific extract or a specific preparation of a given herb, it could also be given to a specific population or people who have a particular disease state. And the results you get there may not generalize to all people. So, a simple version could be maybe the preparation is fine. We are talking about linden tea. Okay. And they found that in people with elevated blood pressure, the linden tea at this given dose at this given frequency was able to reduce their blood pressure on average by this many points. Okay. That was people who already had high blood pressure. So, you wouldn’t want to take that report and be like linden reduces blood pressure by this many points no matter who you give it to. For somebody with normal, healthy blood pressure, we wouldn’t expect that to happen. And we’re grateful for that because we don’t want to take healthy, good-range blood pressure and drop it down by 20 points or whatever. If we had blood pressure that was 20 points too high, we do that. Fantastic. If it’s normal, and we drop it down, well now we’ve given you low blood pressure. and you’re going to have headaches, and you’re going to feel bad. And we wouldn’t want that to happen, and we’re grateful that it doesn’t.

Katja (01:34:51):
But that’s the way that pharmaceuticals work. So, a lot of people… Listen, we all grew up – well, most of us grew up – in a medicalized environment. And so it is not unreasonable that people hear the study about linden and interpret it through the filter of medical science and pharmaceutical science. And then decide that that study means that linden also will drop blood pressure in a person who does not have elevated blood pressure. That’s a reasonable assumption to make if the thing that you know about is pharmaceuticals. But again, that is like hey, that’s not our system. That is a system, and we coexist with that system, but it is not our system. It is not how herbs work. And so we cannot make the assumption that the herb is going to do the same thing that the drug is going to do. Okay. If you have a question, then we should find out. We should follow it up because also maybe don’t assume that it’s not going to do it. But we’re going to find that out. We don’t assume it.

Question Scientific Methods & Results

Ryn (01:35:58):
Yeah, yeah. And so far we’ve been assuming that the study under question was like an intervention trial with actual people, but that’s not always the case either. So, was it a trial at all, or was this some kind of theoretical investigation based on the shapes of the molecules that they found in the plant? Sometimes that happens.

Katja (01:36:18):
Well, and that’s not unreasonable. So, studies get funded because companies are trying to make something that they can patent and sell. And so before they’re going to spend a lot of money on an actual trial that’s going to require a laboratory, or a cohort, or a whatever, okay, that’s going to be expensive. Well, the first thing we’re going to do is just look at the molecules and say does this even make sense? Does it even make sense? We’re going to look at some ethnobotany and say is there any kind of reason to believe that this should make sense? Whatever. So, that’s not nefarious. And it isn’t like cheap, oh, you just copped out and did the cheap thing. No, it is the step they take before they take the next step. Of course, they may take that first step and then choose not to take any further stuff, right, because it does not look like it will be profitable. And now that study is still in PubMed or whatever. So, be careful. That might mean that that study is also not profitable for you. But I do want to clarify that it’s not bad that they do that theoretical molecular modeling or whatever.

Ryn (01:37:34):
Yeah. A lot of times nowadays those are referred to as in silico studies, which just means like on the computer. And then of course there’s in vitro. So, in a Petri dish or in some kind of little model organism or whatever like that versus in vivo. So, like in a living creature. Like the whole creature instead of just some uterine tissue cells from a pig that we put in the Petri dish, and we give some of them cancer. And then we take some herbal extract, and squirt it on there, and watch what happens. That’s like an in vivo study. Sorry, that’s an in vitro study. And then in vivo is like we have an actual pig. And we give it some of the herb, and we see what kind of happens to its blood pressure or whatever it is we’re looking at. Okay. And then of course this also raises is it a study on animal tissues or whole animals, or is it a study on humans? And that can matter a lot. There are frequently cases where what an herb or for that matter a drug does in another mammal isn’t the same as what it does in a human mammal.

Katja (01:38:43):
Yeah. We’re not mice, it turns out. Yeah.

Ryn (01:38:47):
And then of course things like how many subjects did they have to investigate. If there was giving this herb to 20 people or 20 mice who have this health condition or whatever, and we get some results on it. that’s not the same as 20,000. So, there can be issues with that as well.

Katja (01:39:08):
While we’re at it, who are the people? Let’s say that it is a cohort study. We gave it to actual people. Well, if the people aren’t a good match for the herb that we’re trying to study, then we have the inverse problem of a specific population. So, if we’re only studying something in people with elevated blood pressure, fine. But if we’re trying to say is this herb helpful for depression? Okay, well first of all, as herbalists we know that is not a helpful framing, right? Because we need to be more specific. But as medical scientists, that is a frame that they would be working from. So, they may say okay, is this helpful for people with depression? But then they’re not going to take any particular nuance around that. They’re not going to say what type of depression do these people have? They may give clinical separations, like diagnostic separations, but they’re not going to look at that energetically. And they’re not going to say how many of these people have a hot constitution? How many of these people have a cold constitution? How many of these people also have stagnation, or dehydration, or whatever else? And any given herb that they choose will work different in all those parts of the population. So, if we had sorted for I’m looking at heavy depression around menstruation in people who have cold, damp, stagnant constitution, and I work with a particular herb. My results will be really different than if I say I’m going to work with that herb for people who have premenstrual depression across the board. If we just do that across-the-board cohort, we dilute the results. So, it looks like something wasn’t very successful. And then science says see, herbs don’t work. But then they also say they’re totally dangerous. So okay, see herbs don’t work. Well yeah, when you set your study up that way, you’re not going to get good results. But if we had set the study up by having a professional herbalist on the research team, which we don’t do in this country, we would have had a better study that would have shown us for this portion of the population this herb was effective.

Ryn (01:41:33):
Yeah, totally. Okay. But then also, what are these results we got? What were they? How were they collected? How were they identified? Sometimes there’s an objective marker. We can be like okay, we were trying to see if this is going to lower LDL-C cholesterol numbers for people, and we can measure that before and after, and we can see what kind of change we got. But other times it’s going to involve a diary. So, the person is going to check in once a day. Or they’re going to write down once a week about how’s your quality of life right now? And those things are not meaningless, but they do leave a lot more potential for confounded results. For things like the healthy user bias or for people’s problems of recall to come in and muddy up the results for you a bit. So, we just need to keep awareness of what is the type of information that was collected and how was it gathered? And include that in our understanding of how reliable is the conclusion that came out of that.

Consider Meta-Analyses & Learning Anatomy/Physiology

(01:42:41):
Now, not all papers you look at in a scientific database like this are going to be about a trial where we do an experiment. A lot of times they’re going to be a review paper or a meta-analysis where we are looking at a bunch of different papers on that subject, maybe on that herb, right? And saying okay, when I look at all of this body of knowledge about this herb, what can I abstract from that? Papers like that can be really, really helpful because they can bring together evidence from several different intervention trials. They can help to draw out things like well, it seemed like it worked really well for that group. But then for this other one it didn’t seem to go so well. So, we can at least say there are some reasons why it might be better for an individual or worse, right, even if we didn’t identify what those were yet, whatever. But one really important element here is how did they select what articles to include and exclude from their review or from their meta-analysis? And of the articles that were included, not just from the scientist’s perspective but from yours as the clinical herbalist, did they all belong there? Did they do a meta-analysis on lavender, but half the results are about lavender aromatherapy with essential oil, and half the results are about lavender extracts and capsules. And then there was one that was about tea. So, it’s going to depend for you on whether you work with aromatherapy, whether you work with the capsules, or whether you only talk about giving flowers and tea to people. How is it relevant to you, your practice, your methods? Yeah.

Katja (01:44:24):
We do also need to put a little plug in here for AI. This is a negative plug because a lot of these papers are now being written by AI. A lot of papers all over the place are being written by AI. And they are hallucinating. I don’t know why we call it hallucinating. They’re just making it up. They weren’t whatever.

Ryn (01:44:52):
They’re selecting plausible word tokens to go after the previous word tokens.

Katja (01:44:56):
Right. And so they make up studies that don’t exist to cite, and they say the study is real. And then when you look, the study doesn’t exist. Those people don’t exist. The study isn’t real. There’s nothing about it. And this is becoming a problem that is so big that it’s actually a crisis in the scientific community right now. And this has really happened over just like the last three years or even the last two years. Because the generative AI has come so fast on the scene and started creating these that the people who, not regulate but administer and maintain all these different sources, like bodies of scientific studies, are having trouble determining which are which. And they can’t keep up for checking all of them to verify what is real and what is not. There are trackers out there for retracted studies. That when they find these AI slop studies and retract them, that then it’s published in these trackers that say okay, hey, this study actually wasn’t real. If anybody was using this, this one wasn’t real. But you’ve got to be checking in on that all the time.

Ryn (01:46:18):
It’s a lot of work to access that. And I mean, this is a problem that has existed as long as the publish or parish model of academia has existed. There’s been incentives for people to rush something to publication or to present something in a little more sensationalized way, to massage the data a little bit, or to dig through the data you’ve collected until you find a correlation that’s exciting. And to publish on that rather than on whatever your original plan of investigation was going to be. These are known problems.

Katja (01:46:53):
And paper mills have been around too for a long time, which is like an organization that is intentionally creating fake studies. But they couldn’t do it at the volume before. And now just the sheer volume of it is overwhelming the scientific community.

Ryn (01:47:12):
Yeah. And so the incentive still exists for somebody who’s a researcher trying to establish themselves and trying to build up their personal bibliography to the point that they can continue to get grants. And maybe they could get tenure someday if they’re really, really lucky and things like that. And so there is incentive there to be like I’m going to let AI help me to produce an interesting paper. So yeah, that’s a real problem. And one thing we want to make extra clear here, you might have heard this as we were talking but to make extra clear, this is not just a matter of you sitting down at chatGPT.com or talking to Claude, and it’s hallucinating scientific paper citations to you. We’re talking about ones that have now gotten into the corpus of scientific information and are poisoning it.

Katja (01:48:01):
Right. So Claude, or ChatGPT, or whatever will do that. If you ask for something, it will just lie to you about stuff. But this is like you went to PubMed, you got a study. You were searching for something you’re interested in. This happened to me recently. I was looking at wild lettuce and chronic nephritis. And I got a study. And I was like wow, this is fantastic. I really didn’t know, I didn’t expect there was going to be something. I’m so excited. And the study was complete fake. It was real. It was in PubMed, but it wasn’t real. And all the citations were fake, or some were fake and some were not actually relevant to the study itself. They were about a totally different plant and had nothing to do with this paper. And it was sad. I was really upset about it. So, that’s the point is that it isn’t just if you say oh, is there any study that will tell me that this is good on your own AI account? Which don’t do that. But if you did, then the chances that you get a false result back where the generative AI is telling you yes, here is a study from 19- or 2000 whatever and blah, blah, blah. The chances that that is not real, it was totally made up, is very high. But this is about you got a study that was in PubMed, and the study itself was generated by AI and is not real.

Ryn (01:49:38):
Yeah.

Katja (01:49:38):
Yeah.

Ryn (01:49:39):
So it’s a difficult problem.

Katja (01:49:41):
Yeah.

Ryn (01:49:41):
And there is not an easy solution here, right? But the beginning of the solution is for you to develop some capacity to read, and understand, and to interpret these kinds of publications. So, we’re giving you some ideas to get started on that right here in this podcast episode today. You’ve already heard some. We’ve got a couple more. But I just want to make a note that we do get into a lot of detail about this in our course Clinical Skills. This is part of our Clinical Herbalist program. It’s a really big part of that program.

Katja (01:50:13):
It’s a big course.

Ryn (01:50:14):
It’s an extensive course. There’s a lot involved in it. Not only this kind of thing, but we do highlight this kind of issue and give people information and skill-developing methods so they can learn how to look at a study, to extract from it the information that’s relevant to your practice as an herbalist, and to identify cases where this is not actually helpful. This doesn’t say what it claims it does. Or again, there’s a mismatch between the data, the abstract, the title, the headline, whatever else. Yeah. All right. And actually as a side note here, you were raising this earlier that it’s not just about studies on herbs. Is this herb good for X problem? But studies about basic physiology are also very interesting to us as practitioners.

Katja (01:51:04):
I would say these are more interesting to me than studies about herb function simply because a study about physiology like hey, check this thing out that we discovered about the glymphatic system. That is interesting to me because the more that I understand how the body works, and listen, we are still discovering things about how the body works. Do not think that that is set science that is past tense. We are still learning about how the body works. And so the more information that I get about how this works and how that works, that physiology helps me to make decisions about what herbal actions I could apply to impact that situation. It helps me understand where I can hook into a problem because there are no herbs for a diagnosis. We have to find our own on ramps of how we’re going to improve the situation for this person.

Ryn (01:52:13):
Yeah. And so a study about physiology might ultimately help us answer a question that’s shaped like would that herb be helpful for this problem? It would help us answer that question by giving us more context and more understanding about what’s going on in the body. How the body works, how these things play with each other in order to make a plausible theory about what the herb could do or what the actions of the herb could do for that issue. Yeah.

Katja (01:52:40):
And I think that also applies to anatomy and physiology books as well as studies about new information about physiology. Just also recognizing that anatomy is generalized. Each individual body, if you opened every person up, they would not look like the book. The book is like a general representation. But we all grew our own bodies, and we didn’t grow them all the same way. So okay, we all have livers – almost everybody has livers – but maybe they’re shaped a little different. Maybe one’s a little higher, one’s a little lower. Maybe one’s a little bigger or smaller than expected or whatever. Some people have their organs on the other side just because that’s just how they grew them. So, kind of recognizing that when you are studying AMP, that’s good, that’s valuable, that’s going to help you. But it is generalized. And then we have to take that general information and then look at the specific person that we’re working with. And kind of try to line up what seems to be happening for them with the general expectation of what happens in a generalized body.

Be Cautious About AI Scientific Slop, Industry Propaganda, & Statistical Tricks

Ryn (01:53:57):
Right. Okay. So, some red flags when we’re looking at scientific information. First one we kind of talked about already where the citations that are given or the text of the study itself turns out to be AI slop. Like we said, difficult problem, not always immediately recognizable. But just like with any other genre of text, the more experience you have with it, the better able you are to recognize AI versions of it. So, you probably read a lot of emails. And you have certainly received some AI-written emails and been able to clock it as such because you’re like this is different. There are tells in here. And I’m not just talking about the em dashes and whatever. But it’s not this, it’s that. Okay. We know the basics, right? But there are things that kind of just feel a little bit funny to you.

Katja (01:54:53):
Like a little plastic.

Ryn (01:54:54):
Yeah. Because of your familiarity with that type of text when it’s actually made by a human. And the same thing applies to a short story, or to a scientific paper, or whatever else. The more familiar you are with human-generated content, the easier it gets to identify the AI-generated content. So, that’s the first step there.

Katja (01:55:18):
Yeah. And also just keep in mind, this problem is freaking out scientists right now. Seriously freaking. The entire science world has their hair on fire about this problem. So, if you are like oh my goodness, how am I ever going to know what is real and what isn’t real, and this is terrible. Okay. All of science world is also feeling that way. So, this isn’t good, but at least you’re not alone.

Ryn (01:55:51):
You’re not alone.

Katja (01:55:52):
Yeah.

Ryn (01:55:53):
And I mean all the things that we’re talking about here about how to read a study more thoughtfully, more carefully, things to watch out for, indicators of problems. Many of those come to us from scientists who are interested in the process of science and the products of science and how to improve them. It’s not all an herbalist meditating with a plant and being like I think the scientists have some flaws in their perspective here. Yeah, sometimes we can bring that in because we know the herbs better. But a lot of this is going to apply to any kind of science that’s being done. Social science, whatever, it’s not only health and medicine. Basic errors can be a red flag. So, like that study about lettuce you were looking at.

Katja (01:56:34):
Yeah, I was looking at wild lettuce, but there were two references that weren’t to wild lettuce. And they were of course the two most important references. One was to sea lettuce, and one was to a specific strain of vegetable lettuce for a salad that had been developed to have no potassium, like genetically-modified to have no potassium, so that people who were taking a specific drug could eat a salad. And okay, well that’s not how… neither one of those are helpful.

Ryn (01:57:10):
Not applicable to the wild lettuce in my yard right now.

Katja (01:57:12):
Yeah. Neither one of those have to do with Lactuca virosa. Not at all.

Ryn (01:57:18):
Right. So, when something like that happens. When you’re looking at it, and you’re like wait a minute. I thought this was about this plant. But first of all, your botanical name doesn’t match the common name that you’ve started using. And then later on here I look at your citations, and this one is about that botanical Latin name for the plant. And this is a different species. Okay. Maybe I don’t write it off yet. Are they close enough in physiology? Are they similar enough versions that we could swap them out as herbalists and not feel like we were losing something? Okay, maybe, but then maybe not, right? An old school example is like review papers about ginseng that included data on Panax ginseng, Panax quinquefolius, and Eleutherococcus senticosus. And you’re like okay, some of these things are like each other, but I thought we were doing a paper on Asian ginseng. That’s only one of those three.

Katja (01:58:09):
Only one. Yeah.

Ryn (01:58:10):
Come on, let’s tighten up the ship here a bit. Yeah.

Katja (01:58:14):
Yeah.

Ryn (01:58:14):
All right. So that kind of thing is a red flag. Yeah. Okay. And then how about some industry propaganda? And again, we’re trying not to do conspiracy here, right? But if I’m looking at it, and I’m like hey, wait a minute. This is a study about cacao polyphenols, and it’s funded by – I don’t know…

Katja (01:58:40):
Hershey’s.

Ryn (01:58:41):
Hershey’s, yeah.

Katja (01:58:41):
Yeah.

Ryn (01:58:43):
Then I’m going to have some hesitation in the way in how far I carry their conclusions forward.

Katja (01:58:50):
It’s not unreasonable for a corporation to fund a study about their product. In fact, one could even say that’s responsible. Because if I’m going to sell this thing, I want to make sure that it actually does what it says. It’s not any different than cars being crash tested, but…

Ryn (01:59:12):
Yeah. I mean Sambucol has funded a number of studies of Sambucol. This is a commercialized brand of elderberry syrup. And they funded some good studies. You know that they’re funded by that company. You know that they’re more excited about the positive results. We also recognize that there can be this situation where there’s selective publication and selective non-publication. If there was results that were bad or really didn’t do any better than placebo, there’s an incentive to not publish that anywhere, and put it in the drawer, and just leave it there. And that happens.

Katja (01:59:50):
That happens. So, the thing here is that just because it was paid for by the industry does not automatically mean that it’s wrong or bad. But it does mean hey, I should look at this three times. I should be really sure that this is solid. And when I’m doing it, I should think about what other studies did this company pay for that I’m not seeing?

Ryn (02:00:19):
Right. And especially if you’re encountering a reference to a study in the form of a headline, or a snippet on social media, or something like that. Just remember that oftentimes the magnitude of effect, even if what they’re describing is correct, the magnitude of effect could be very, very different. So, it could be like oh, turmeric relieves joint pain. Okay. Well, how much? And how much did you need to take to get joint pain relief? And is that in a dose in a format that we can replicate at home or at the store and give to somebody? And those all might cash out to be yes. Turmeric example is maybe not the best here because it can do a pretty decent job actually. But you can certainly imagine a case where a company makes a product, they want to run a little study on that. They get a result that’s promising but small. The degree of benefit that the study subjects received was statistically significant but still pretty minor. But then you just remove all of the references to magnitude, like potency, and you just say the end result. It improved depression. It improved joint pain. It reduced blood pressure, whatever.

Katja (02:01:34):
Instead of it improved depression for 1% of the people in the trial. Or it improved joint pain by 3% or whatever. It lowered cholesterol levels by 0.01%. Instead we just say it lowered cholesterol levels. Yay. Yeah.

Ryn (02:01:54):
Yeah. So, that can often be a bit of a mismatch there. And then individual researchers might also have an agenda of some kind that can go into the whether we publish or whether we put it in the drawer kind of thing. It can also go into p-hacking and other forms of statistical manipulation, especially when you have a big data set. We collected data from a whole bunch of people over a long span of time. And originally this was done for a specific purpose. But then we were like well, we’ve got all this data. So, why don’t we just kind of go looking through it and be like oh, but I can make a correlation between how much red meat they said that they ate on their one week or once a month diet journal, which is not super trusty. And the incidence of this health problem, or their levels of cholesterol in the blood, or whatever else. And I can draw some connection between them. So, that happens a lot in nutrition science especially. But it can happen in other areas as well where somebody has a bunch of data, and then they just look for some interesting or exciting correlation because they know they can get that study published.

Katja (02:02:58):
Yeah. Whether or not that correlation is actually valid is not as important as if it is publishable and will look great on their resume.

Ryn (02:03:09):
Exactly.

Katja (02:03:09):
Yeah.

Look for Energetics, Simple Herbal Extracts, Mechanisms of Action, & Actionable Studies

Ryn (02:03:10):
Yeah. Okay. So, a lot of things to watch out for. A lot of things to watch out for. But there are also some green flags in this realm too. One of them that we’d love to see, and this would be on a study that’s like we’re trying this herb for a problem. We’re going to see if it can help that problem, that kind of an intervention trial. What we like to see there a lot is if they include traditional syndrome differentiations or basically energetics. So one example I really like was a study that was done on working with rose essential oil or absolute, I think it was, applied to the temples to see if this could relieve headaches and migraines. And in that study this was being done from a Unani Tibb perspective, and so they were assessing people for their constitution under that system. Which is pretty similar to your sanguine, choleric, melancholic, phlegmatic thing. But essentially what they came away with was the rose essential oil is way more helpful for people with heat in their constitution than for people with cold as the dominant factor. And of course that makes perfect sense to us herbalists, right? Because rose is cooling. And if you have a hot type of a headache, it’s going to be more helpful for you than if you have a cold pattern one. So, it matches up really well. It fits in with our framework for understanding plants and people coming together. And so that’s really valuable. We love it when that kind of thing is included in the study design.

Katja (02:04:41):
Yeah. That does not happen very often in the United States. But it does happen much more frequently in international studies, which are now much more available. It used to be really hard to get international studies, and then you also had to be able to read them. But now they are auto-translated and included in PubMed and whatever, so it’s so much easier to find them. But so yeah, when you see in the methods that they were making some sort of differentiation in their cohort about who they expected to benefit or who they found to benefit in the end, then that is a study to hold onto.

Ryn (02:05:25):
Yeah. Right. Because again, you work with those same kinds of differentiations, right? Again, directly relevant to your practice. Okay. Another one is very similar. It would be if the study is investigating what they’ll usually refer to in a scientific context as a quote crude extract, right? Or in some cases like a galenic extract might be a phrase that’s used. But that really just means the kind of remedy that you can make at home: tea, tincture, infused oil, salve, vinegar extract, all that kind of stuff. Crude. And why is that a green flag? Again, because that’s what you work with, right? Yeah.

Katja (02:06:05):
Right. Yeah. If the study is on a hyper-concentrated, isolated extract, you don’t work with that. Maybe you can buy it, maybe you can’t. It just depends. But if it’s on three cups of tea a day prepared in this method with this many ounces of herb, or this many grams of herb or whatever, and this much water, okay, well you can do that. So, that study actually is actionable for you.

Ryn (02:06:34):
Yeah. And that can and should catch your attention. For years I was really skeptical about the claim that spearmint could reduce excessive levels of androgens in the human body, particularly relevant in the case of PCOS or what they now call PMOS. And I was like that’s interesting, but people make a lot of outlandish claims about herbs, and hormones, and stuff like that. So, I’m naturally skeptical of those when I encounter them. And then I did a little bit digging. And I was like wait, these are studies on spearmint tea. These are studies on two cups of spearmint tea in a day, and they’ve got pretty significant results, and this is actually real. And that changed the way I talk about spearmint to people who are dealing with PMOS symptoms. And again, it was because of the format. It was because of the way they were preparing that.

Katja (02:07:29):
Right. If that had been an isolated extract concentrated to whatever percent, then it wouldn’t have been as interesting unless you could purchase that, and you wanted to work with that. Yeah.

Ryn (02:07:42):
Exactly. All right. Sometimes a study will propose a mechanism of action. Not just we observed this herb making a change in this blood parameter, or this symptom severity, or whatever. But here we’ve identified some of the chemistry in the plant and what it’s doing on those kind of microscopic levels, the mechanism of action. So, when those are more relevant to our work or we can make some kind of practical connection, then that’s going to turn into a green flag. So, an example would be self-heal, Prunella, has been identified as being able to reduce microclots in the bloodstream. And that’s pretty interesting to us. We know that microclots can be one of the components that contributes to long COVID symptoms that people are dealing with. And so that’s a very interesting connection. That might give us more reason or another layer – is probably the better way to say it – of reason to recommend self-heal to somebody dealing with those kinds of symptoms if we think that they’re contributed to by microclotting in that particular individual. Because not all long COVID is going to only be driven by that one issue.

Katja (02:08:51):
That particular study was actually really, really interesting because it included a chart of multiple plants and what was the mechanism by which they impacted microclotting. And so another favorite of mine, Erigeron canadensis, was in this study. It was a Chinese study, but they were still working with Erigeron canadensis, and differentiated oh, the self-heal is working in this way. The Erigeron is working in that way. And there were like 20 herbs in this chart, and each one of them were categorized as to what was the mechanism of action. But it was always like oh, it impacts the way that fibrin is working, or it doesn’t allow it to clot up. Or it impacts different –

Ryn (02:09:45):
Platelet formation or whatever.

Katja (02:09:47):
Yeah, exactly. And so a paper like that that has a chart where it is differentiating the mechanism by which each of those plants are working, that is super useful. Because that means that I have enough information to look at the actions of those herbs and think about how I can apply them to lots of different situations that might involve microclotting. Yeah.

Ryn (02:10:14):
Yeah. And just to contrast that with a sort of like molecular mechanism of action that’s not as relevant or not as powerful for us.

Katja (02:10:25):
Actionable. Yeah.

Ryn (02:10:26):
Yeah, actionable. There was a while when COVID was kind of first raging, and people were looking at different options for it. And some folks were talking about elderberry. And they were like well, some of them were saying I’m a little concerned about elderberry actually because I saw this study that indicated that it could increase interleukin-6. And that’s a pro-inflammatory cytokine in the body. And we wouldn’t want to generate more inflammation because what if we give somebody a cytokine storm, and now we have them really, really sick and in big trouble? And the thing about that was that that was one identified mechanism of components of elderberry, but it wasn’t the only one. And it turned out that yeah, elderberry could upregulate a couple of pro-inflammatory signaling molecules in your body. But it could also upregulate a whole bunch of anti-inflammatory molecules in your body. So, this is not yet enough information to say elderberry is going to increase inflammation in people or turn a basic fever into something life threatening. And also reality check, that’s not backed up by anybody’s experience with elderberry in the real world.

Katja (02:11:40):
And yet at that time the internet was on fire with claims about elderberry and cytokine storms, just based off that one result for that one mediator. No.

Ryn (02:11:56):
So that was, again, lacking context. It was one isolated piece of information that people were extrapolating from into a concern that doesn’t manifest in the real world. Yeah. And so in all this you can get a theme here that we’re looking for what’s functional. And ideally the study would be in free-living humans, not in some kind of artificial-living environment where they’re locked in a lab or something like that. Ideally in free-living humans with a relevant form and dose and frequency and so on. That’s closer to the way that we’re going to work with plants. And the closer the scientific information is to that, the more helpful it is. That’s the simplest rubric. How close is this to your actual work?

Katja (02:12:43):
Yeah. Otherwise it’s interesting maybe, but not very actionable.

Ryn (02:12:50):
Yeah. We’re not yet going to be doing things with that.

Katja (02:12:52):
Yep.

Ryn (02:12:53):
Okay.

When You’re Still Not Sure About a Source

Katja (02:12:55):
All right. Well, there’s one other thing here because boy, this has been a huge, long list. And sometimes you see something, and you’re like well, I heard you list all those ways, all those green flags and all those red flags, and I’m still not sure about this. Do I trust it? Do I not?” And first off, it’s okay to not be sure. Listen, no herb teacher is perfect. No anybody is perfect, but no herb teacher is perfect. And so you might be seeing like well, there’s some things that don’t make me feel very comfortable, but then there’s some other things that seem pretty educationally solid. I’m not really sure. If you have found teachers who you trust, you can ask them. Because well, the herbal community is getting bigger, and it’s harder to know everybody. But a lot of us know a lot of us. And it is okay to just ask, and say hey, you person who I’m studying with, and I trust your opinion most of the time. Don’t ever trust anybody 100% of the time. What is your opinion of this teacher? And so in order to do that, you need to make sure that you’re going to a school where you can ask your teachers questions. And I think that is maybe the most important green flag. Well, there’s many important green flags, but it’s an important green flag.

(02:14:28):
There are a lot of educational programs out there where they’re just shoving some stuff out, and that’s the end of it. You can’t ask them questions. Or you can, but the question doesn’t get answered by the actual teacher. Or maybe there’s some student group, and you just have to depend on other students to give you an answer, and you never are able to have contact with that teacher. So, that doesn’t necessarily mean that whatever the information is, it’s automatically bad. But it does mean that you can’t decide that for yourself. You can’t access more information for yourself. So, make sure that you are studying with someone who you can actually talk to and ask questions of. And when you find somebody that you feel comfortable with, not somebody who’s perfect because nobody is, but somebody who you feel comfortable with their judgment, comfortable with their opinion. And most of the time what they talk about either works for you or works for the people in your community for whom it is appropriate because maybe it’s not right for your body. And ask them what their opinion is on this particular source. Or hey, I saw this paper. Is this meaningful to you? Is this actionable? Is this whatever? Yeah.

Ryn (02:15:47):
Yeah. So, you can do that with us. We think we raised some green flags. We do our best to keep the ratio high. And so we’d love for you to learn with us. But hang on. You might want to wait a little bit.

Katja (02:16:04):
Yes. This podcast is coming out the last weekend of June. Don’t join us yet. Wait until July 1st because that is when our semi-annual 20% off sale happens. The code this year is CATNIP. And you can get 20% off all of our online courses from the smallest to the biggest. And you still get to ask us 100% of your questions. So 20% off is a pretty good deal, and you should take it. You can join the Community Herbalist program. If you’re a total beginner, get Family and Community together. Because that’s going to help you learn the material if you’re doing both of them in tandem. If you are advancing in your work, and you want to join us at the clinical level, grab the Clinical Herbalist program. If you’re just trying us out, just get a little taster course like the Stress Management course, which I really am very excited about how that course came out. That’s a brand-new course this year, and it is fantastic if I do say so myself. So yeah, the way that you learn best is when you have guidance, when you have a community, when you have people who you can interact with and teachers who care about making sure that you get your questions answered. And we’d love to do that for you.

Ryn (02:17:42):
We would. So, we’ll see you in July.

Katja (02:17:45):
Oh wait. And you can do all of that at online.commonwealthherbs.com.

Ryn (02:17:51):
That’s right. All right. So until then, that’s it for this episode of the Holistic Herbalism podcast. We’ll be back soon with some more. But for now, please take care of yourselves. Take care of each other. Drink some tea.

Katja (02:18:05):
Drink some tea.

Ryn (02:18:06):
And vet your sources. All right everybody. Bye.

Katja (02:18:10):
Bye-bye.

Today we’re sharing some thoughts about uncertainty versus imposter syndrome, and learning herbalism. Recently, we did a 20 Questions video for the folks at HerbRally – it ran nearly four hours long! Two of the questions we were asked wove a theme together, and we wanted to share them here.

The first question was “how do you deal with uncertainty as an herbalist?” The person asking this may have been expecting some kind of study trick that would help them to feel confident enough in their skills that they didn’t feel uncertainty in their practice – like an antidote to imposter syndrome!

But we have this sign in our apothecary that says “there’s only the hard way” (and if you know, you know!) and that applies here: the way of herbalism is uncertain. Accepting the presence of uncertainty is the first step toward navigating it confidently.

Now, we’re not talking about under-training: the first thing to do is to get trained, of course. But once you have trained for years and years, and even once you’ve been in practice for years, you are still on a journey with uncertainty. Which sounds a little zen, perhaps – and actually, a little bit, it is! Training the mind to accept uncertainty, while still finding the truth of the moment, is as important a skill for an herbalist as it is for a monk.

Next, someone asked us about mistakes new herbalists make, and how long it takes to “feel like you know what you’re doing.” (Do you see a theme here?) They want to know if it’s going to take years to feel confident, or if there’s some way to accelerate the development of that confidence. Yes.

These questions come up for lots of herbalists. Especially because a lot of us are practicing alone in our communities. Sure, there are herbal friends online, but maybe you’re the only herbalist in your town, and you’re feeling the weight of that solitude. A lot of folks don’t have elders or mentors available, and that makes it harder to practice.

One solution to that problem is online clinical herbalism mentorship – and we’ve got that for you!

Did you know that you can book a one-on-one Zoom session with Katja to talk through your goals, your challenges, and how to get you where you want to be in your herbal practice? You can! It’s open to anyone, and the easiest way to book one is to go to enroll in any free course – they’re at the top of the list. (They’re truly free: you don’t even need a credit card.) That will set up a student dashboard for you, and right there on the menu on the left you’ll see, about halfway down, Quick Help Sessions – click that link and it’ll take you right to the scheduling calendar!

If this episode caught your attention, then our Clinical Skills course is for you! Learn to practice legally, safely, collaboratively, and effectively. Get all your client forms & scheduling systems sorted. Cultivate consultation interview skills, and explore methods for planning personalized protocols. Everything you need to be a top-notch herbalist!

Like all our offerings, this self-paced online video course comes with free access to twice-weekly live Q&A sessions with us, lifetime access to current & future course material, open discussion threads integrated in each lesson, an active student community, study guides, quizzes & capstone assignments, and more!

If you enjoyed the episode, it helps us a lot if you subscribe, rate, & review our podcast wherever you listen. This helps others find us more easily. Thank you!

Our theme music is “Wings” by Nicolai Heidlas.

Episode Transcript

Katja (00:14):
Hi, I’m Katja. And I’m here at Commonwealth Holistic Herbalism in Boston, Massachusetts. Today, I’m really excited to share some thoughts about uncertainty, imposter syndrome, and learning herbalism. So, recently we did an interview, and two of the questions that we were asked wove a theme together. And that’s what I want to share. The first question was how do you deal with uncertainty as an herbalist? And I think that the person asking it was probably expecting some kind of study trick that would help them feel confident enough in their skills that they would not feel uncertainty as an herbalist, kind of like an antidote to imposter syndrome. But we have this sign in our apothecary, and it says there’s only the hard way. If you know, you know. And I think that applies here. The way of herbalism is uncertain.

(01:18):
And I’m not talking about under training. Obviously, of course, get trained. Get trained really well. But once you’ve trained for years, and even once you’ve been in practice for years, we’re all still on a journey with uncertainty every single day of our practice. Which sounds kind of a little Zen, and actually a little bit I think it is. Okay. So, that was the first half of this. And then the second question in this theme, someone asked about mistakes that new herbalists make and how long it takes you to feel like you know what you’re doing, right? Okay. So, do you see this theme here? I think that these questions come up for lots of herbalists, especially because a lot of us are practicing alone in our communities. Maybe you have herbal friends online, but you might be the only herbalist in your town. And you might feel the weight of that solitude, and responsibility, and lack of peer network.

(02:29):
A lot of folks practicing herbalism don’t have elders or mentors available locally, and that makes it harder to practice. Of course, a solution is online mentorship, and we’ve got that for you. In our Mentorship program we meet every week. We work in clinic together. We walk through all the challenges that people have with all different kinds of cases. We build supports where you need them. We even push on those to help you start to really feel confident about the work that you’re doing. And you can learn all about that at our website, commonwealthherbs.com. Or you can just send us an email. It’s info@commonwealthherbs.com. So, if you want to know more about that. But for now let’s think through these two issues. And hopefully it’ll give you encouragement and support for wherever you are right now in your herbal journey.

How to Deal With Uncertainty: Interventions as Experiments

Ryn (03:30):
So, this first one came in from Caden, and they asked how do you deal with uncertainty as an herbalist? And my immediate response was endlessly all the time. And also enthusiastically because you have to be enthusiastic about uncertainty to be a good herbalist in my opinion. And you do it with curiosity, right? Because uncertainty isn’t bad news. Uncertainty means that there’s more information to be gathered before you can proceed.

Katja (04:00):
I think that’s the key. Honestly, I think as an herbalist there is only uncertainty. Literally. There is never certainty. If I ever am in a situation where I am encountering certainty, then I know there’s actually a problem.

Ryn (04:16):
We don’t mean on the level of bitters stimulate digestive secretions. Okay. We can be certain about that. We’re talking about more involved, more nuanced questions.

Katja (04:24):
Like when you’re working with somebody. And the reason that this is, is because every body is different. And so no matter how many times a very strong infusion of chamomile has helped people you know with menstrual cramping, you don’t know for sure that it’s going to help the next person because their menstrual cramping might be different. What’s going on in their body might be different. And so everything that we do is uncertain. Everything that we do is an experiment. And so we take all of our education and all of our experience, and we direct it at the problem. And we come up with a solution that we think is going to work based on the person that we’re working with and the experience and the education that we have. But then we also acknowledge this is an experiment, and we’re going to now do the experiment. And if it doesn’t work, that’s not bad. That’s data, which is a theme I think we’re going to come back to a few times throughout this. That’s data. And that just means no problem. We just need to make adjustments so that it works right based on the information that we got back.

Ryn (05:39):
Right, right. We frame our interventions as experiments. And I mean that both for myself if I’m like oh, I want to try a different herb and see if that feels similar to fennel or feels similar to ginger in my body when my stomach is upset or whatever. But also when we’re sitting down with a client, and we’re saying I think that this blend of herbs is going to be helpful for you for these reasons based on what you’ve been describing and telling me about and other information that we’ve gathered. This is what I think will help, and this is why. This is an experiment. You’re going to go, and you’re going to try this for a while, and you’re going to see what kind of results you get. And when something is set up as an experiment, that includes the expectation that some adjustments are going to be made as we go along.

(06:23):
Sometimes you nail it right away. You’re like okay, you’ve got this kind of digestive sluggishness and slow down. We’re going to try something that’s primarily based on ginger. We’re going to see if that warms you up and gets things moving. And then it does. And you’re like well, that’s what I thought would happen. Yeah. But other times it doesn’t work the way you expected. And the way it doesn’t work is also information. That’s just as helpful as the name of the problem or the particular type of discomfort feeling that they get and that they describe to you. The success or failure or partial success or partial failure of whatever you try is more information. And oftentimes that’s what helps you get to the answer. The next experiment is what it really gets you to.

Katja (07:08):
Right. Until you find the thing that actually works.

Ryn (07:11):
Yeah.

Katja (07:12):
Yeah.

Ryn (07:12):
Yeah. So the goal of the work isn’t only we’re going to solve the problem. We’re going to make you feel better. Even if something works, that’s also good data. That can also tell you what else might be helpful or what else you can try if say there was an herb that was really handy for you and did the trick. But what if it’s an expensive herb? What if it’s an herb that’s hard to come by? What if it’s an herb that is available now, and then suddenly it becomes more often out of stock at all the herb suppliers? Anybody who used to buy violet every month from Mountain Rose 10 years ago probably knows what I’m talking about. That’s not as easy as it used to be. And so things may change on you, but gathering the data from the experiment helps you to know what you can expect to work next time.

Katja (07:57):
There’s one other thing that I want to add here, which is that when we expect uncertainty, when we choose uncertainty as a mode of practice, that protects us, and it protects our clients or our community members. Because when we approach a situation with certainty, then we are removing power from the client. We are walking in and saying this you must do because I said so, because I am certain. And that does not serve the client because now they’re just doing what we said. Do they know why? Like what if it didn’t work, but they don’t feel empowered to tell us that and whatever else. If we approach every situation with uncertainty and curiosity. Not uncertainty like oh no, I’m scared to do this. Don’t think of it that way. It’s the curiosity. It is the yeah, I’m not certain. I think this is going to work, and we’re going to try it. If you approach every situation that way, then you are always on equal footing with the person you’re working with. You are in collaboration with that person instead of trying to have authority over that person. And knowing that you are collaborating on an experiment, that you’re expecting feedback from them. That you are not just expecting it but empowering them to give you feedback, to let you know. Did they like it? Did they not like it? Did it work, but they didn’t like it? That’s possible. Was something weird happening? When you are approaching everything as an experiment, then they feel free and open to be able to tell you things. But when you approach something with certainty, then they’re going to feel like oh, maybe I just did it wrong. I can’t.

Ryn (09:52):
Maybe they don’t talk to you ever again.

Katja (09:54):
Yeah, exactly. Exactly.

Ryn (09:55):
Yeah. Which doesn’t serve them, and it doesn’t serve you either. We need to get feedback. We need to get follow-up with clients to really know if what we’re suggesting even makes a difference.

Katja (10:03):
So uncertainty, we love it.

Biggest Mistakes New Herbalists Make: Learning Only in Your Head

Ryn (10:05):
Yeah. All right. Next question from Natalie here. What’s one of the biggest mistakes that new herbalists do? And then how long does it take herbalists to feel like they actually know what they’re doing in your experience? I love this question. I love both of them, and I love that they fit together. So, here’s some mistakes. One, trying to learn herbalism only from books and lessons. Trying to learn herbalism entirely within your skull.

Katja (10:36):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Ryn (10:37):
Well, I guess your skull has your tongue and your nose in it, so…

Katja (10:40):
Trying to learn herbalism only in your head.

Ryn (10:45):
Only in your brain. Yeah, yeah. So you can read a lot of information about plants, and it can be really informative and exciting, and it can open your eyes to new possibilities.

Katja (10:55):
And hopefully you’re reading it in one of the books that is not the 82% of books that are AI slop.

Ryn (10:59):
Yes. One hopes. One hopes, yes. But if you never ever taste an herb, then no matter how many times you’ve read about the effects of bitters to stimulate your digestive secretions from saliva to stomach acid to bile to pancreatic fluid and all the way through. If you’re only reading about that, and you’ve never experienced it, you’re missing something. If you’ve never experienced what it’s like to take a squirt of cayenne tincture onto your tongue, you’re missing something. And that can make a really big difference in how well you’re able to share this knowledge to other people.

Katja (11:30):
Yeah. Plus if you are only learning it in your head, then you are completely trusting whoever it is that’s teaching you. And if they’re wrong, you don’t have any way to find that out. So, it’s important to try it because that’s the verification. Okay, now all bodies are different, and it’s possible that you can learn something that just doesn’t apply to your body. That is true. But that’s a little different than you know that actually just wasn’t even a thing. You’ve got to try it in your body.

Ryn (12:06):
And without having that kind of experience, then when you run into contradictory claims about an herb, you won’t have any way to pick a side. It will remain in the fog of unknowing, and you won’t be able to navigate out of there again. Yeah.

Katja (12:20):
Plus, if you are only learning in your brain, then you’re putting a ton of pressure on your brain to remember every single thing that you learned. But let me tell you, where do you hold the memory of the flavor of an apple? It’s not in your brain. It’s in your mouth. If I ask you what does watermelon taste like? You know that in your mouth. You don’t have to check your brain for that. You don’t have to go to your flashcard with the information about what apple tastes like. And so the more that you are trying these things in your body, the more that you are holding the knowledge of herbalism in your guts, in your joints, in your nerve cells, in your whatever, because that’s where your experience is. Now okay, yes, of course your brain is involved in whatever, but it’s different than straight up memorization.

Ryn (13:17):
Right.

Katja (13:18):
Yeah.

Ryn (13:19):
And directly connected to this is another common mistake, which is to try to create a spreadsheet or a database that’s going to have all the herbal info in it. And again, the problem is the excessive focus on collecting information and collating it into a legible format without living it, without doing things with that information. Without experiencing it yourself, and figuring out, and finding the places where the statement on paper gets a little fuzzy in the real world. Or the places where that does apply, and the places where there’s exceptions to it, or things that change the way it functions, or things like that. So, the temptation is if I have it all written down, and I have it all on a database, then I’ll be able to go look it up again later. But it’s better to have the lived experience, to understand the limits of your own personal lived experience and how that’s going to be different for other people, and that will allow you to generalize and also to respond to new and unexpected circumstances.

Katja (14:26):
Did you ever hear the phrase it’s more important to understand the math than to memorize the math, or get the right answer, or whatever? And I think that is – I don’t know – I think that’s kind of an obtuse statement because I think a lot of people don’t like math very much. But it is the key here. It is more important for you to understand the system, understand the full context. Because if you just memorize every herb, what are you going to do when you find a new herb, and there’s no book about it? I don’t know, right? If you understand herbal actions, and you understand how do you determine what the actions of an herb are. And then how do you apply those actions and where are they relevant in the body? If you understand the system, then it’s really easy to insert new herbs into the system or to insert new bodies into the system that break down in different, new, exciting ways.

Ryn (15:31):
To do things with the herb that you have never seen written down.

Katja (15:33):
Yeah.

Trying to Be an Expert ASAP & Do Everything All at Once

Ryn (15:34):
Which doesn’t mean that nobody’s ever done that before. But it’s not among the first 10 things that somebody wants to include in their book, and their editor has a certain page count in mind. Other factors like that really go into what’s available out there in terms of the information that’s accessible to you. Yeah. All right. Here’s another big mistake. I think we’ve kind of covered it already, but to try to get certified as a master herbalist as soon as possible. That’s a mistake. That is a mistake. It’s a philosophical mistake because learning fast isn’t the way to learn deep. And it’s a practical mistake because you are going to get frustrated if you just try to cram in as much information as possible. It’s also going to lead you to skim reading stuff and believing that you’ve now learned it. But not taking the time to go and prepare the remedy and make three different versions of tincture from that same plant material. Or to get two different batches of plant material from different suppliers, and prepare them in the same way, and taste the differences, and try to figure out why they’re there. All those kinds of experiments that really deepen your knowledge and make it real, and persistent, and flexible. Okay.

Katja (16:44):
The thing is that our society kind of pressures people to become overnight experts. You can’t do that in herbalism. It cannot be done. So, your friends are asking you these complicated health questions. And you’re like hi, I’ve only been studying this for a while. And I don’t actually know the answer to that question. And so I think that the corollary to this or like the parallel to this is give yourself permission to take a long time. Don’t put that pressure on yourself because it will just lead to imposter syndrome. It will just lead to poor skills. And it will lead to you feeling bad about the work that you do. Society is not going to say oh, it took you 10 years to become an herbalist/ Good job. They’re going to be like How come you didn’t do it in one year? But all the herbalists are going to be like good job. You gave yourself 10 years. You gave yourself 20 years. Whatever. Take permission for yourself. Demand that permission because you deserve however much time it takes you to develop the skills that you want to develop. And even if the whole world thinks you can be an expert in a weekend or whatever, they’re wrong. They’re just wrong. And you don’t have to put that pressure on yourself.

Ryn (18:17):
Right. And you don’t have to put the pressure on yourself to get outside of your scope of practice, comfort, capability. Which is another thing that happens when people are like I have to be a full-fledged, complete herbalist who can do anything as soon as possible. Well, you’re not going to be. And then that means that you’re going to start finding yourself trying to do things that you’re not really ready for, or able to do safely, or to think through carefully. So, we don’t like that. That makes us worried.

Katja (18:44):
The wise woman at the edge of the woods, she’s not young. She’s never young, right? You don’t have to learn this fast. It’s impossible to learn this fast. So, if you feel like you have to, you’re literally torturing yourself. Don’t do that to yourself.

Ryn (19:04):
And a really similar thing is to try to do all of the kinds of herbalism at the highest and most professional degree all at once. So, another common mistake for people starting out with herbalism is like I’m going to build a clinical practice, and an herb shop, and a product line, and an herb farm. And I’m going to do all of those things in the next year. No, you’re not.

Katja (19:25):
You’re not going to do all those things at all.

Ryn (19:27):
You’re not going to do any of those things. Yeah, because those are all really big undertakings that are going to have a multi-year plan to fully grow out. And any one of them is at least a single human’s entire focus and energy budget. Oftentimes more than one human.

Katja (19:47):
I mean, also it’s not legal. So, there is that. There is that. But there’s not a lot of regulation on herbalism, but there is some. And if you want to sell products, you are not actually allowed to do teaching or clinical work. There are maybe some gray areas there with clinical work but okay, it’s the law. It’s the regulation. On the other hand, in this case a lot of people think that this is a bummer. They get mad about this regulation. But I think it’s hysterically great because the reality is they made a regulation that just reflects reality because actually you cannot do all those things at the professional level. Now, you can certainly grow some herbs. And you should, you can certainly make some medicines. You can certainly whatever. But if you run an herb shop, you can make a bunch of medicines to sell in your herb shop, sure. If you’re a clinical herbalist, of course you can make a bunch of medicines and whatever. But at a professional level that is going to burn you out so hard, and then you’re not going to be healthy. And also you’re going to hate your job. And also you’re just not going to be able to maintain it for very long. And there’s so many examples of that happening. So, it’s kind of funny that the regulation actually is completely aligned with what’s actually healthy in a holistic way for humans because it doesn’t always happen like that. Yeah. But yeah, it doesn’t mean that you can’t live on a homestead, and small -cale farm a bunch of herbs, and then also be a clinical herbalist. But just don’t try to make all of those things a job because it’ll just hurt you. It’s too much for one person.

How Long Before Feeling Like You Know What You’re Doing as an Herbalist

Ryn (21:41):
Yeah. So, the other part of Natalie’s question there was how long does it take herbalists to feel like they actually know what they’re doing? And that’s a good thought. Does anybody feel like they know what they’re doing? Well, not 100% of the time.

Katja (21:59):
I think that’s where #adulting comes in.

Ryn (22:01):
It’s also where the uncertainty discussion comes in. I can go into a consult, and I can say I know what I’m doing because I know how to navigate uncertainty. Which is different from I am completely familiar with all of the medical diagnoses and rare diseases that this person says that they’ve got in their history. Those are two different things.

Katja (22:21):
Yeah. I think the number one thing that every single mentorship student says when they really start working in clinic. And they start working in clinic after several years learning all the beginning and intermediate material, right? The thing that happens for every single student is they say oh my God, I really don’t know anything at all. But not in a despairing way. It’s almost like a rite of passage because it literally happens to every single one. And so we’ll be in round table, and somebody will be like and this is when I realized I actually don’t know anything. And again, they’re not realizing that in like what have I been doing with my life? I don’t know anything. I’m so depressed. They’re realizing it in that way of everything that you studied to get to this point was just the vocabulary. It was just the beginning. And then now we’re going to write poetry, but metaphorically. And so it’s like a whole new world when you start working with people, and you really start seeing that every single person is totally different. And knowing all the herbs is one thing. But like oh boy, now how am I going to present that to this person? And how am I going to make it fit for them? And how am I going to engage them? And this person’s really quiet and shy, and I want them to collaborate. And how do I draw them out? All these places where now it is about sharing it with somebody in a way that’s going to be profound and change their lives. That’s hard stuff.

(23:59):
And so when students say this, every time I feel like it’s a huge party. I’m like yeah, you’re in the club. But the thing is that they also seem to feel that way too. Kind of like when you get to a certain level, you just give up all those ideas around certainty and around knowing things, and you just realize that every single situation is different. And there’s something freeing about that. Yeah, back to that idea of uncertainty. There is something freeing about realizing that you’re not actually certain. And that doesn’t actually impair your ability to do the work. In fact, it invites the people you’re working with closer into collaboration with you. And of course you can always say I need to look that up, or I need to talk to my mentor about that or whatever. And then other things you’ll be like well, I have six ideas in my head. I’m just not certain which one is going to work for you. Oh, okay. Well, that’s an invitation to collaboration, right?

Ryn (24:57):
Yeah. For sure.

Katja (24:59):
Yeah.

Ryn (25:01):
Once upon a time, Paul Bergner taught some classes at some herbal conferences, and they were titled How to Become a Master Herbalist in 30 Years or More. And that one, I’m pretty sure everybody who’s ever heard that, it really sticks with you. And definitely true for me, for us.

Katja (25:19):
Yeah. I think I want that as a poster on the wall. We’ve never done it, but…

Ryn (25:22):
It’s fantastic, right? Because it’s just basically saying you’re not going to do this fast. You don’t want to try. But slow and steady practices like opening up a materia medica book every day, tasting several herbs every day, doing blind experiments that you develop your senses and your capacity, doing formulation experiences like we were talking about before, or ways to re-imagine a case and multiply the experience you get from it each time. These kind of things are what helps you to get to that place of confidence within uncertainty. That’s what we like. That’s what we like.

Learning to Practice in Uncertainty

Katja (25:57):
I think that’s a really different kind of confidence than beginner’s confidence. Where you’re fresh out of taking your exam for Community herbalist, or intermediate herbalist, or whatever. And you’re like ah, I know stuff. I’m ready. And that kind of confidence is really different than the confidence in uncertainty. Because that first kind of confidence is where we always have to remind students like hey listen, you’re going to be sitting with a client, and everything is going to fly out of your head, and that’s okay. That doesn’t mean you’re not a good herbalist. It just means that right now everything flew out of your head. It’ll come back. Don’t worry. And the first time that happens to a beginning herbalist, or you just pass the exam, and you’re beginning to move forward. Then it shakes you. And now people are talking about imposter syndrome. It’s like no, no, no. You’re just coming into this place of learning to practice in uncertainty, and that’s a different experience. Yeah. All right. Well, if you listened to all of that, and that sounded great. But now you feel like you need to make a training plan, I can help with that. I don’t know if you knew, but you can book a Zoom session with me. These are free sessions, and we will talk through your goals, your challenges, how to get you right now to where you want to be in your herbal practice. These are open to anyone. The easiest way to book one is if you go to online.commonwealthherbs.com and enroll in any course. The free courses are fine. They’re right at the top of the list, just grab one. You don’t need a credit card if it’s a free course. All you need to do is make a username and password. That will set up a student dashboard for you, and it’ll put your course right on it.

(27:46):
We have multiple free courses. Actually, grab them all. They’re great. And you should always test out the free stuff that people give you from their school before you commit to any school because that helps you know if that school is really right for you or not. So grab one free course, grab all the free courses, whatever. But when you do, you will have a student dashboard set up. And on the left-hand side of that dashboard there’s a menu. Or if you’re on your phone, you know the little menu stack at the top. And about halfway down that menu it says quick help sessions. If you click that link, it’ll take you right to the scheduling calendar so that you can book a session with me personally. Hi, Katja. I will talk to you about this. And we can figure out whatever you need to get where you want to be. So, grab that. And if all those instructions were like you’re driving, and it’s too hard to remember it or whatever. Then when you get to a place where you can, just email us at info@commonwealthherbs.com and ask anything you want. We are here to help. So, next week we’re going to be talking about how to know whether herbal information is trustworthy or not so that you can learn with more confidence. And until then, this is where Ryn would say take care of yourselves. Take care of each other. Drink some tea. And get curious about uncertainty. Bye-bye.

Accessibility in herbalism is not something extra or something nice-if-possible, it’s a critical part of our work. The prices of the remedies we recommend can sometimes be a determining factor in whether our clients take them, or take them long enough to get results. In many cases we can identify less expensive herbs, or formulae of herbs, which can do the job of more costly ones. In order to make an effective substitution, we first need to clarify the qualities, actions, affinities, and other aspects of the herb for which we seek alternatives. Only then can we identify a good substitute.

This episode includes thoughts and examples of potential substitutes for solomon’s seal (Polygonatum biflorum), kava (Piper methysticum), Asian ginseng (Panax ginseng), dong quai (Angelica sinensis), teasel (Dipsacus fullonum), arnica (Arnica montana), chaga (Inonotus obliquus), goldenseal (Hydrastis canadensis), and schisandra (Schisandra chinensis).

This is material we dig into deeply in our Accessible Herbalism course. That course is full of strategies and skills which enable herbalists to offer top-quality care to people who have constraints on their finances, time, energy, or community of support. It helps you understand the truth behind some of hte most common money-saving suggestions about herbalism and nutrition, so you can offer realistic suggestions which actually help people who need it most.

Like everything we offer, it’s a self-paced online video course. It comes with lifetime access to current & future course material, the twice-weekly live Q&A sessions with us, open discussion threads integrated in each lesson, an active student community, study guides, quizzes & capstone assignments, and more!

If you enjoyed the episode, it helps us a lot if you subscribe, rate, & review our podcast wherever you listen. This helps others find us more easily. Thank you!

Our theme music is “Wings” by Nicolai Heidlas.

Episode Transcript

Ryn (00:00:15):
Hi, I’m Ryn. And I’m here at Commonwealth Holistic Herbalism in Boston, Massachusetts and on the internet everywhere, thanks to the power of the podcast. All right, so today on the Holistic Herbalism podcast I’m going to be talking about affordable analogs for expensive herbs. But this is not just going to be a list of plants. Because the truth is that’s not actually the most helpful way to think about this issue or to try to resolve it. So, instead I’m going to be talking about ways that we can understand the process of substitution and some of the elements of that process that are going to involve the cost of the target herb that we would really like to work with and the substitute herb that we’re going to choose to work with instead. And how to think through some of these aspects and elements that have to do with the cost of each of the herbs in order to make an actual good decision, and one that really is going to be saving you or your clients some money. All right. But we can’t do that in a vacuum because there are going to be other factors that get involved here, including the person’s energy, and amount of time, and a few other things that are going to become important. As well as what we’re going to do with the herbs once we’ve got them. Because there are some circumstances where an herb looks less expensive on paper if we just compare the price per pound or something like that. But in reality it may not be that much of a difference, or it may be that there’s another way that we can navigate through.

Ryn (00:01:45):
So, all that said, I want to just begin by reminding everybody that I’m not a doctor. I’m an herbalist and a holistic health educator. And so the ideas discussed in this podcast do not constitute medical advice. No state or federal authority licenses herbalist in the US, so these discussions are for educational purposes only. I also want to remind you that good health doesn’t mean the same thing for everyone. Good health doesn’t exist as one objective standard. It’s influenced by each person’s individual needs, experiences, and goals. So, I’m not attempting to present a single, dogmatic, right way that you should adhere to. I’m just sharing some concepts and some ideas for you to work with yourself. Everybody’s body is different. So, the things that I’m talking about here today may or may not apply directly to you. But my hope is that they’re going to help you to find some new information to think about, to research further, some ideas to experiment with so that you can carry this on forward. Finding your way to better health is both your right and your own personal responsibility. Now, that doesn’t mean you’re alone on the journey, and it doesn’t mean that you’re to blame for your current state of health. But it does mean that the final decision about following any course of action, whether it was discussed on the internet or prescribed by a physician, that’s always your choice to make.

Accessibility is Integral to Herbalism

Ryn (00:02:58):
Okay, cool. So, here’s the thing about accessibility. Because today’s topic about affordable analogs for more expensive plants, this is a subset of a broader range of material around accessibility in a bigger sense. And the thing that Katja and I have come to feel very strongly about the longer we’ve been herbalists, and the more that we’ve done this work, the more clients and students that we’ve worked with, is that accessibility and herbalism is not something extra. It’s not something that well, it’s nice if that’s possible. But it’s not like a critical part of our work, you know? It’s sort of this side consideration or the third, or fourth, or last thing that we end up thinking about. So, that’s not the way that we think about this in our school, in our practice, in the way that we work, in the way that we think about herbs in the world. This isn’t about settling for less either, right? It’s not like well, if you can’t get the really good stuff, then I guess you can take this third-rate herb over here, and you can just try to get something out of that. No, no, no. That’s not the way we’re going to look at this, right? We can give our best to everyone, and that doesn’t have to mean that we give the same herbs to everyone. So you know, if we consider the situation of somebody – a client, a student, a friend, whatever – who says yeah, you know, I’ve been taking this remedy, this herbal remedy. And it helps me, but it is expensive. And you know, I can’t afford to take it forever for what I’ve been paying for it. It really does make me feel good, but I just can’t keep on buying it.

Ryn (00:04:37):
So, we want to find a satisfying answer to that situation. We want to be able to say okay, no problem. Let’s break this down. Let’s figure out what is going on here, what is helping you, and where we might be able to get similar effects from something else. Okay. So, we want to do that. And we want to also keep in mind that the prices of the remedies that we recommend to our clients or our friends or the ones that we want to take for ourselves, those prices can sometimes factor in to whether the person in question – I’m going to refer to a client in this context a lot – whether that client will take the remedy at all. Or, and this is equally important, whether they will take it long enough to get the results that we’re aiming for. A lot of times herbal work is slow. It can take a month to get the results we’re shooting for. It can take three months, it can take six months, it can take even longer in some cases. And so if there’s something that seems to be moving in the right direction. We’re starting to see indications of positive change, but then we can no longer afford it. Well, we’ve lost an opportunity there, right? Something was working, and now we’re not able to sustain it. So, that’s something we really want to be able to navigate, right? That’s the idea behind all of this.

Ryn (00:05:50):
Okay. Now like I said, this concern about cost, financial cost, dollar cost, doesn’t exist in isolation. The fact is that resource constraints of many different kinds are going to factor in and are unfortunately going to make health less accessible to a lot of people. So, those factors include money, obviously. They also include time. They include energy or like the inner reserves a person has. They include that person’s mobility or their ability in a broader sense. And I’ll have an example that will illustrate that momentarily. And then it can also include community support. Like who is around them? Who do they have to call on, or are they alone, right? Are they lacking in that? And this can also even include situations like what is impacting the community at large. Whether that is austerity measures of some kind that have changed the economy they live in and have made it more difficult for them to access things. Whether it’s happening on a global scale as is currently going on. A lot of international shipping and other things have been restricted. Or there have been much significant increases in the cost, especially here in the US where we had this whole tariff thing going on. And so that has changed the availability and the affordability of a number of herbs that we work with regularly. And we’ve seen this. You may have seen this in your own perusal of the price list at your favorite herbal supplier. So, you know, things like that are part of the community that a person lives in, and those impact their experience and their accessibility as well. And then of course there can be things like a disaster, natural or manmade or whatever else. Everything from hurricanes, and tornadoes, and floods to wars and other things like that, those can have a big impact on what is accessible to a given individual.

An Accessibility Example

Ryn (00:07:44):
So, today our focus is primarily going to be on money, but I want to make clear right up front that all these other elements need to be part of our consideration. So, an example here is very helpful. So, we’re thinking about the way that these different factors intersect for a given person. And in some cases that can be a way to escape the problem. If a person doesn’t have a lot of time, doesn’t have a lot of energy, but they do have a decent amount of money. Well, it’s not like you can buy your way out of health problems. Except sometimes it gets pretty close to you being able to buy your way out of health problems, right? It just removes a significant barrier, and it can compensate for these other aspects of accessibility that that individual doesn’t have. They don’t have time, they don’t have energy, but they’ve got money to work with. All right. So, there can be a situation like that where one area of resource can compensate for a constraint somewhere else. But this also means that these things are going to intersect or layer over one another. And that is something we need to keep in mind when we’re making a recommendation.

Ryn (00:08:55):
So, here’s an example. Maybe somebody was going along, and they were getting a significant benefit from working with a high-powered, very high-quality extract of turmeric in some capsules. And they had been taking that, and they had been feeling a significant improvement in their digestive function. And they had even maybe gotten some lab results before and after they began working with it. And those had to do with liver function, like liver enzyme production levels and other indicators of liver capacity and liver function, bile flow, and factors like that. And they’re like yeah, you know, I started taking these turmeric capsules from a really good brand, and they seem to be making a big difference for me. My tests are better. I’m feeling good. Things are working out great, but they are kind of expensive. And so maybe they’re coming to ask you what do you think I should do? Should I buy a cheaper one? Is it going to work as well? Should I try something else instead? So, sometimes people who have learned a bit about herbalism will look at a situation like that and be like well, you know, a lot of what you’re talking about is coming from the influence of turmeric on your liver function and on digestive function a little more broadly, right? So, you’ve got a cholagogue here. You’ve got this bitter herb that gets the bile flowing. That has a lot of benefits for your body. You know, there’s some anti-inflammatory action to this product that’s going to be active on the mucous membranes in your intestines and are going to benefit that. So, you know, it’s not exactly the same, but hey, what about burdock? Because burdock is a weedy herb, super common where you live. It’s growing all over. You could go out, and you could dig some up, right? And you could take those burdock roots and clean them, chop them up, and make a decoction. And then burdock isn’t exactly the same as turmeric, but it is a hepatoprotective. It is a bitter cholagogue. It gets the bile flowing. And it has these benefits on intestinal integrity through a mechanism of supporting healthy gut flora, right? We get a prebiotic action from burdock. So yeah, a little different from turmeric, but I think it has some of the same end results. And so maybe that would do the job for you.

Ryn (00:11:04):
Okay, hang on a second. Dig up your own burdock roots regularly. Make a decoction and consume that every day. Compare that to buying some capsules, opening the bottle, and taking them, right? The difference in energy and time outputs is vast. It is significant. It is really extreme, right? Because if you’ve never harvested a burdock root, you’re going to need a shovel. You might need a digging stick to loosen up the stones, and the rocks, and everything. It depends on what your soil is like. You’re going to be there for a while to get one root out. You might break off half of it and not be able to dig down and get all of it out. And then it is going to take a while to clean that root, to chop it up. It’s going to take some energy and some strength in your wrist and in your fingers. And not everybody’s going to have those things, right? Also, not everybody is going to want to take the time and effort to prepare a decoction daily or even every couple of days or to consume that decoction in amounts of at least a quart per day. Which is what we’re going to need if we’re going to try to mimic the degree of impact this person was getting from this other high-powered turmeric extract product they were taking. So, on one level that is a reasonable idea of a substitution. But when we start to think through the reality of it, right? Going outside, does that involve driving somewhere, taking your tools, digging some stuff? Do you have permission to dig here? Putting in the energy, digging it all out, getting your root. How many are you going to collect? How many are you going to work with? Where are you going to keep them? Are you going to be able to process all of them in a timely fashion when you get home? Are you going to prepare this every day? Are you going to drink that much of it every day? Is it going to taste good to you? So, all those other elements have to get considered when we’re looking for a substitute for a more expensive plant, or in this case a more expensive product. Okay. So, keeping all of that in mind.

Knowing the Cost of Herbs & Can I Grow It?

Ryn (00:13:06):
One other element I want to, I want to list here or enumerate here before we go any further is that when you’re talking about these concepts with someone else – again, say, a client – then there’s different ways that you can approach that. So, one of them would be like oh, you know, there are these really good herbs that could help you, but they’re kind of expensive. So, do you have money? Can you afford that sort of stuff? No, no, let’s not do that. Instead let’s say something like you know what? I want to just do a quick little budget check before we go too much further. So, we’ve been talking for a while, we’ve got a decent plan started. We’re talking about a capsule product here, a tincture blend, a tea formula that we’ve put together. And just as a ballpark, I think that all of this is together going to roughly be about X dollars per month. So listen, if that’s not reasonable for your budget, no problem. We can dig in, and we can look for some other options. We’ve got other options we could choose. There’s always another herb that we could work with instead. So this is my ballpark estimate for where we’re at right now. How’s that feeling? This feels very different, right? Because there’s a big difference between can you afford that, which is sort of absolute and sounds kind of timeless, and is this a good fit for your budget right now? That is specifying a time. It is acknowledging that the person has other expenses in their life. And so it’s a much friendlier way to raise this kind of consideration with somebody. And I think that that can make people feel a lot more comfortable and not put on the spot. And just from a practical standpoint of a practitioner, more likely to give you the realistic answer that you need.

Ryn (00:14:54):
Okay. So, a simple idea is that in many cases we can identify a less expensive herb or sometimes a formula of herbs which can do the job of a more costly one, right? And if we want to be able to do that, that does require us to have a sense of what herbs cost and what the products that are made from them cost, right? So, like what does the raw root dried and chopped from good-quality herb supplier, what is that going to run me? What should I expect that to cost? And with that we want to keep the real cost of the plant in mind, right? So, if I can go, and I can find $10 a pound rhodiola on Amazon or some other seller, that doesn’t mean that that’s good stuff. That doesn’t mean that that’s a good replacement for the rhodiola that I might pick up from Mountain Rose herbs where we’re talking about $150 per pound, right? Because that stuff may not even be rhodiola. It may be contaminated or adulterated with other plant material mixed in. It may be very old. It may be from a poor-quality area that just didn’t grow properly. Any number of things could be wrong with that. And we should suspect that several of them probably are, if it’s being sold for that much under what we consider to be a realistic price for really good-quality plant material. So, we do need to look at the prices for the different herbs and the different things that we want to recommend. It’s important to do that on kind of an ongoing basis or a rolling basis anyway. If once a year you create a price list of your top 20 recommended herbs or the ones you go back to most often. At least that much, right, if not every herb you keep in your apothecary, or every herb you’ve recommended to anybody in the last year. You just run through and be like all right, what’s the price update on this? Because again, they do change as circumstances in the world change, as politics happens, as wars happen, as climate change happens. All these different factors are influencing these prices, and they will continue to flux. So, it’s good to check in every now and again.

Ryn (00:17:05):
All right. So, we want to look at our prices, we want to compare them. We also want to be making sure we’re attentive to things like relative weight and potency. So for instance, calendula is a nice, lymphatic herb and quite effective at what it does. It’s currently trading at around $41, $42 a pound at a reputable supplier. And that’s pretty solid. There are other herbs that are doing some, if not all, of what calendula does, right? Maybe we just focus on it for the moment as a good mover of lymph. If I want to find an herb that’s less expensive, this may not be a place to look at pokeroot. Because comparing poke and calendula is a little bit tricky right? Now, if you know exactly how you want to work with it, that might clarify this for you a little bit. If you know you want this to be an ingredient in a daily infusion tea blend. Then pokeroot isn’t going to be a good fit because that doesn’t really come out very well in an infusion, and it also doesn’t taste very good in an infusion compared to calendula. If we know that’s the context, then a good choice could be cleavers. Cleavers is also a really good lymphatic herb, and it’s currently about $20 a pound. So half the price, pretty solid, right, a pretty good deal. If I knew though that I was going to be preparing a tincture, then it may be… And it was even not in a formula at all, it was just going to be by itself. We’re just focusing on lymph movement. It may be that calendula tincture and pokeroot tincture are not that different in price, but you also know that with pokeroot your dose is going to be significantly smaller. Like with calendula it could be a full dropperful several times a day or two or three of them even. And with poke we’re going to be counting in drops. Start with five, 10 drops of poke tincture. And so ounce per ounce, the poke is going to last you longer. It could last you three times as long, right? And so that means that even if it was twice the price for the same volume of tincture of poke as it is for calendula, it could still be the better deal.

Ryn (00:19:13):
Okay? So, just as an example that’s why I wanted to raise that, that we do need to think through those facets, those practical aspects of what we’re doing with the plant, how we’re preparing it to a remedy, how we’re going to take it, how much we’re going to take over time. Those are also going to play into the considerations here.

Ryn (00:19:32):
Okay. You know, another thing that comes up, and actually calendula is still a good example for this, is well yeah, it’s expensive, but could I grow it? I’ve got a balcony that I could put a bucket on, and I could put some herbs in there. Or I’ve got some actual ground. I’ve got a yard. I’ve got an area that I can dig, and I can grow some plants in. So, is calendula a good option there? And in this case it actually kind of is, because calendula is not so difficult to grow. Because once it gets established, and once it’s growing for the year, then it will produce multiple flowers. Or each plant will kind of produce one at a time. But you can grab that flower, come back in a couple days, and there’s a whole new one for you. So, you can continue to do that and have like a harvest over a period of time. Now, this does assume that you’ve got the energy and the time in your day and in your life to dig a garden bed or at least put some dirt into a bucket to get the seeds into there. To water them at least for the time until they’re well-established, and they can thrive on their own. And then to go out and harvest and to probably do that daily or every other day for an extended period of the flowering season. And so again, it won’t make sense for everybody, but for some people this could be a good way for them to access calendula. It could turn out to be much less expensive for them than buying it in.

Ryn (00:20:52):
But there are some herbs that it’s very difficult to grow your own, and it may not actually save you what you were hoping, right? So, if you are looking for an affordable analog for ginseng for instance, ginseng, Panax ginseng, Asian or yeah, Asian ginseng is what we generally would refer to that as. That can be trading for up to $240-$250 a pound. So, you might be like well, what if I grow some? You know, maybe that could be a good way to go. But ginseng doesn’t grow just anywhere. And it’s not one of these plants like calendula that if you live in the city and you’ve got a balcony and a bucket of dirt, you can just grow it there. Ginseng is one that really for it to grow well you need a forested environment. You need to grow it as a forest floor plant. And that actually comes with several considerations beyond just having access to that kind of land, having the capacity to go and plant ginseng there and to go back and visit it and collect it later. You’ve got to protect that plant while it grows. So, you might need to make a cloche, like a covering for it with wire or something like that to protect it from the deer who are going to want to come by and eat that tasty, young ginseng baby, right? And you may need to tend it repeatedly. If it becomes suddenly a drought season, you may need to go back there and bring it water on a regular basis. So, ginseng is not one of the easiest plants to grow, and this is part of why it’s an expensive herb.

Ryn (00:22:23):
Similarly, rhodiola won’t grow at all in a lot of the places where people might like to cultivate it. It has certain requirements about the type of light it gets exposed to, the photo period, like the amount of light hours there are in a day and some other facets like that. So, it’s not going to just grow in all parts of the world or all parts of the country. That means that maybe it’s an option for you if you live up in Alaska. But if you’re in Florida, it’s really unlikely that you’re going to succeed in growing rhodiola, right? And it’s not just Florida. There’s a wide swath of the US for instance where it’s never going to work out. So, you know, and I raise that in a similar way of being like just go and wild harvest some cool stuff. Which people often toss off as like a way to save money on herbs or to get free herbs, right? It’s never free. There’s always some kind of outlay of energy, time, all that kind of stuff. So yeah, those are some considerations we’re going to keep in mind with that.

Polycrest Herbs & Key System Tonics

Ryn (00:23:25):
Okay. When we’re thinking through this, we’re also recognizing that just looking at the price list in the abstract gives us some kind of data, but it’s a lot better to look through a more specific lens. So, today we’re focusing on affordable analogs for certain expensive plants, okay. We could also be looking at plants that can do a lot of different things, and can be prepared in a lot of different ways, but don’t cost a lot of money. So, my favorite example of all of them for that is garlic. And this category is what we call a polycrest herb. This is, again, herbs that can do a lot of different things, and I also like to add on and can be prepared in a bunch of different ways. Those kind of feed into each other, of course. But a polycrest herb means just that. It means that an herb can do many different things in the body. So, think about garlic, right? And think about an actions list that’s attached to any given plant. Where you look at it for oak bark, and you get okay, astringent and well, it’s really astringent, you know? And then with garlic, you’ve got okay, it’s antimicrobial. It can be immune stimulating. It’s a circulatory stimulant. It’s a digestive carminative. It’s a hepatic stimulant. It’s a cholagogue. And we can go on for quite a while when it comes to garlic. It has many powers and many capacities. And this is of course why it’s such an important herb and why it’s spread all across the human world. And it’s made its way into cuisines of many different continents let alone countries.

Ryn (00:25:03):
But so medicinally speaking, garlic is one of the most powerful but also flexible remedies that we’ve got. We can do tons of different things with it and again, we can prepare it in different ways. We can make tea with garlic, which is a fantastic thing to do if you have a respiratory infection coming on. We can eat it in food naturally in different forms. We can chop it fresh. We can have powdered garlic, whatever. We can tincture garlic. We can infuse it into wine. We can infuse it into oil as well. Not every plant can be infused into water, and alcohol, and oil, and honey, and vinegar, right? But garlic, we can do it in all of those menstruums. So yeah, very powerful stuff. We can do topical applications, we can take it internally, on and on and on with garlic. And wicked inexpensive, really widely available, you can get garlic at a corner store. You can get garlic at a bodega. You can get it at a grocery store. It’s familiar as well, right? Most people have consumed it in various forms, consumed it as a spice, eaten it in a bunch of different ways. And so the familiarity is also valuable when it comes to this kind of a thing, right? So, there are other examples of polycrest herbs. I think betony is an example of one. You know, we could name some others, but that’s one way to think this through. And to be like all right, well if I learn plants like that, that are also not too costly. Then that’s really valuable for me as a practitioner because now I have a number of ready options to go to that may be able to fit the needs of this individual right now because they’re so multifactorial, because they’re poly crest.

Ryn (00:26:45):
All right. So, that’s good to build up for yourself, and one way to think through these problems. Another one is to look at single herbs that are really good tonics for key systems of the body. So, if we were to look at the digestive system for instance, ginger is an example of a tonic for the digestive system. Ginger, of course, it has its qualities to it. It’s not for every single digestive system of every human everywhere all the time, in any form, in any dose. But it is for a lot of digestive problems, for a lot of people, a lot of the time. And I think that’s pretty solid, right? So, ginger has that warming capacity, that that fire-building effect, and that’s good for sluggish and slow down kind of digestive problems. It has an antinauseant effect, which can be really good when people are getting nausea from really any particular source. Ginger is helpful for nausea from consuming food that’s a little bit off. It’s helpful for consuming a meal that was just heavier than you were ready to digest at the moment. It’s helpful for when people are getting motion sickness. It’s helpful for people getting nausea from the effects of chemotherapy or in pregnancy, the nausea there as well. So, you know, ginger has a broad array of effects in that regard. Ginger is also a nice relaxant. So, where there are tensions, cramping, spasms, that kind of thing, it can be really helpful. And so again, we could continue on. But I’m sure you can think of lots of different ways that ginger could be applied or that you’ve worked with ginger for not just one specific digestive problem, but a number of them, right?

Ryn (00:28:28):
If we think about the urinary system, maybe we start thinking about nettle. Nettle is not just a diuretic. It’s also an anti-inflammatory to the entire urinary system starting with the kidneys and then going down the tubes into the bladder and then all the way out through there. Nettle has some tonifying effects on those tissues as well. So, it’s not just making the water flow through faster. It’s also tightening up any laxity that’s present there, right? So, again, not literally every problem needs to be met by a tonic herb in that regard. But as long as a good, broad range of them are, that’s a really good herb to learn. And the less expensive that herb is, the more helpful it is for solving this kind of issue that we’re dealing with today. Okay.

Being Clear on Desired Herbal Qualities & Affinities

Ryn (00:29:13):
So, when we’re trying to make an effective substitution, we want to do a couple of things. And one of them is to clarify the qualities, the actions, the affinities that the herb has and other aspects of the plant that we can keep in mind and, and be really clear and solid about. That’ll help us to identify an alternative. That’ll help us to identify a substitute and to do that in a way that’s actually going to be effective for the case at hand. So, the key idea here is that we’re not going to look at our target plant and say okay, now I need to find another herb that does everything that this target plant does, and everything it is, everything it does, everything it can be. Instead, we want to first ask ourselves what am I trying to accomplish with this plant? And we can kind of broaden that out and say what am I trying to accomplish means what is this plant doing for this person? Or what do I want it to do for this person? I could say what is this plant doing in this formula, right? If it’s part of a multi-herb remedy, what is its job? What is its role? And both of those are going to go back to again, the qualities, right? Which is like the energetics of the plant. Is it warming or cooling, moistening or drying, tonifying or relaxant? It’s going to go to that. It’s also going to go to specific actions the herb has. Is it anti-inflammatory? Is it antimicrobial? Is it adaptogenic? Is it astringent? Is it carminative? Is it whatever, right? The more clarity we have about why the target herb is helpful or why we expect it would be helpful, the better able we are to identify a substitute. And this aspect is relevant when we’re searching for one less expensive. And it’s also relevant when we’re searching for one because we just don’t have that plant today. Or because it’s no longer available any of the usual places we go to look.

Ryn (00:31:28):
If you’ve been listening to the podcast for a while, you’ve heard me talk before about how when I first started learning herbalism from Katja, violet was an herb that we would regularly order by the pound. And it was inexpensive and it was always available. But it hasn’t been for several years now. And we’re not a hundred percent sure if it’s changes in what people are producing or what value they could get for it. Versus something else, and they chose to grow that instead, or what exactly is driving this change. But it does mean that you can’t really just go and easily buy inexpensive violet by the pound anymore. And so we search for alternatives. We often settle on linden. And this can be an example of what’s going on, right? Just matching the effects, or the actions, or the energetics, right? So, both violet and linden are cooling, moistening, relaxant with a strong affinity for the heart and with this capacity to bring in fluid and to help your body to utilize fluids more effectively. To release tension throughout your whole system, including your cardiovascular system, but with a lot of affinity for the heart itself. And they also play really nicely in a tea format, or you could put them into a tincture, some other options here as well, right?

Ryn (00:32:47):
So, they share a lot of qualities, but they don’t have to share all of them, right? For instance, I consider violet to be really good at moving lymph. And that’s particularly cool because a moistening herb that moves lymph is one you really want to pay extra attention to. That doesn’t happen very often. Most lymphatic herbs are drying, okay? So, violet is a moistening lymphatic. And linden is moistening, but not so much a lymph mover. It doesn’t really have that capacity to it. So again, they don’t have to have a hundred percent overlap. And if you tried to achieve 100% overlap, usually you just end up frustrated or feeling like you can’t actually find what you’re searching for. So, that’s the first thing. We’re going to look through these specifics of the plant. Let’s say we’re looking at energetics, right? So, if I say I’ve been working with a very warming remedy. And really the main thing that it’s helping me out with is just being hot and being stimulating. It’s also drying, and it has a decent tonifying aspect to it as well. Thinking of an expensive verb that has those qualities, maybe we end up… Actually maybe we even go all the way to something like Asian ginseng, Panax ginseng. That has those qualities: warming, drying, tonifying. Or it could be something like angelica root, which is not super expensive as these things go. It’s not on the level of your ginseng. But it can be a little pricey if you’re getting really good quality stuff. But yeah, warming, drying, tonifying, right? So, if we were really just looking for something based on similar energetics, then I’ll tell you one of the cheapest herbs out there for that is going to be horseradish. And actually garlic, garlic would also fit into that same energetic range.

Ryn (00:34:42):
Now, if we add on another layer, and in this case maybe we look at affinity. We look at the type of tissue that the herb is bringing those energetics to in the body. Then now this can get a little more interesting. So, here let’s take the example of Solomon’s seal. Solomon’s seal is cooling, and moistening, and relaxant, but it’s also got a very high affinity for connective tissues in the body. And so when your connective tissues are dry, and tense, and painful, it’s usually going to come together with those. Then it’s very, very helpful to have a remedy that can cool off some inflammation, that kind of heat that could be present there. And also bring in moisture and release tension. And so Solomon’s seal is amazing for a lot of connective tissue problems that have that pattern. They might crack and pop as you move them around. They might grind and feel that pain and discomfort there. Solomon’s seal is super helpful. We can take it by mouth. We can apply it topically. We can take it as a tincture. We can put it into decoctions. We can infuse it into oil. We can do a variety of things with it. Okay. So, if I’m just like all right, Solomon’s seal is fantastic. But it is one of those herbs that’s trading above a hundred dollars per pound. So, is there something less expensive that I could work with and get those same kinds of effects to those same kinds of tissues?

Ryn (00:36:09):
So, thinking about this for years, my conclusion is that one of the better options here is actually the seaweeds. And that can be different seaweeds. We can look at bladderwrack, we can look at kombu. We can get them from different places. But I found excellent quality seaweed for like $30, maybe as high as $40 a pound. So, it’s a significant reduction from what we would be paying per pound for the Solomon’s seal. But they have the same energetics: cooling, moistening, relaxant. They have that affinity for the connective tissue. The thing that changes here is that we can’t take them in exactly the same way, right? So, if I’m going to go ahead and work with Solomon’s seal, then I can take that as a tincture. I can take it in a decoction like I said. I can do the oil infusion, and I can apply that. I could mix oil and tincture together and get a liniment, and I could rub that into the particular joints that are painful. But those are the main methods for Solomon’s seal. For the seaweeds, you’re not going to make a tincture. And you’re also not going to make an oil infusion because they don’t really convey their virtues through those methods. You could make a seaweed tea and drink that regularly. But much, much better would be to make a seaweed into a broth. And consume that and actually eat the seaweed and get the whole thing into you. That’s where you’re going to get the maximum benefit from your seaweed.

Ryn (00:37:34):
The other major application for seaweed is topical. But that would be with a wrap or a poultice. So, you would take the seaweed and rehydrate it with warm or cool water. Either way is fine. You would apply that to the joints that are uncomfortable, wrap it up and keep it in place. And then leave it on there for like an hour, two hours overnight can even be a good idea with this kind of application. So, it is a different mode. Maybe a person finds that the liniment is much less of a hassle for them, right? I grab the bottle. I squirt it in my hand. I rub it into the joint. Okay, I am done. It took a minute, two minutes, whatever. I can do that a few times a day, no problem. For the seaweed thing it’s like okay, when in my day am I going to have an hour or a couple of hours or more to prepare this stuff, to put it on, and then to be relatively still while we let it soak in. And so again, that has to go into our consideration of whether this is a good choice for that person, whether it is a good replacement.

Cost Calculations

Ryn (00:38:38):
When we get into the details here, we might also notice some interesting changes in our calculus, right? So, if we were comparing decoction to broth, for instance, because those are kind of the most similar of these two herbs’ preparation methods. Now with Solomon’s seal again, we’re looking at $100, $105 a pound, somewhere in that range. If I’m going to make a decoction, I’m going to work with a significant amount of plant material, and I’m going to be using up more. I’m going to be putting in more of my plant material at least every other day to get a good effect out of that decoction, right? You can cook it down through the first day. You can drink it. You can add more water. You can cook it for the second day. Okay, maybe even the third day. All right, fine. But still, you’re going to be putting in your spoonfuls of your root, and you’re going to be getting it in there, and you’re going to go through it. You’re going to go through it. With your seaweed, the same thing is going to happen. You’re going to be putting a few spoonfuls into each day’s preparation of broth. You’re going to be eating it down, so you’re going to go through it. So, the pace of working through what you’ve acquired is going to be pretty similar, right? And that means that that price comparison is much closer, right? A hundred dollars a pound, $40 a pound, $35 even, right? So, that’s going to be a closer comparison in that circumstance.

Ryn (00:40:02):
But if we recognize that Solomon’s seal is one that we can prepare as a tincture, then this may change our calculus a little bit. Because I did some math on this. And, you know, to buy a pound of Solomon’s seal, that’s 16 ounces, okay? And if that is again, going for $100, call it $105 a pound. Well, I can prepare a tincture. And when I prepare a tincture, for Solomon’s seal you can do it in different strengths. You can do a 1:2, a 1:5, but a 1:4 is a decent potency for a Solomon’s seal tincture. That’s pretty reliable. We can go ahead and do that, right? So, if I do that, then the 1:4 ratio means – we can go with ounces here – for each ounce of the plant material, I can prepare four ounces of my finished tincture, right? So, this means that from my pound of Solomon’s seal, my 16 ounces, I’m going to prepare 64 ounces, half a gallon, half a gallon of tincture, okay? And so even if we don’t forget to account for the cost of the menstruum, the alcohol. And checking in on this we’re going to need like a little more than a handle, which is like 1.75 liters. It’s like a standard size that alcohol is sold in. We’re going to need a little bit more than that, all right? But we can buy that much for $20 to $60, depending on how fancy you want your vodka brand to be, right? If I’m going with the lower-cost vodka, we’re talking like $20, $30 per pound, sorry, per handle, 1.75 liter. That’s almost enough to prepare my whole batch of tincture. And so, we call it $30, $40, like somewhere in that range is what our alcohol’s total going to cost. So, we tack that on. Now we’re paying like $145 total for all the materials that went into the process.

Ryn (00:42:11):
And when it comes out, again, we’re going to finish with maybe not the full 64 ounces. Maybe it’s more like 62 or even 60 ounces. But we’re getting into a range here where the cost of the finished product is about $2 per ounce. And that is not a price for Solomon’s seal tincture that you’re ever going to find from one that you purchase. A lot of times Solomon’s seal tincture is trading at 20, 30 or even more dollars per ounce. So, you’ve definitely saved yourself money by preparing your own tincture. And if we are going through our Solomon’s seal at a rate of something like two droppersful taken three times per day, which is a pretty baseline dose for Solomon’s seal tincture for these kind of ongoing chronic joint pains and, and discomforts. Well, if we do that, then we’re going through six dropperfuls each day. A dropperful is about a milliliter, and an ounce of tincture is a little less than 30 milliliters. So, essentially we’re going to go through an ounce of tincture about every five days. That means that if I’ve got 64 ounces, or 60 ounces even if we subtract what’s kind of like stuck in the marc at the end of the process, that’s going to last me quite a while, right? I’m going through an ounce every five days. 60 ounces times five is going to get me 300 days. So, that’s a pretty good span of time. That’s a pretty good span of time for what we laid out there, right?

Ryn (00:43:52):
Now, all of this of course hinges on the fact that the person can and will take their Solomon’s seal as a tincture. Some people don’t consume alcohol. And so for them we can set all of that aside, and we can know that the seaweed is going to be the better way to go. Because if they’re going to be preparing their remedy in water, the Solomon’s seal is going to be a lot more expensive, like three times more expensive than the seaweed remedy is going to be, right? But for a person who can consume alcohol and is happy to do it, and the burn in the mouth doesn’t bother them and whatever. Then this could be the better option to go for protecting their joints, bringing in those energetics of cooling, and moistening, and relaxant into those connective tissues. All right. So again, we’re looking for those nuances. We’re looking for those details. Those things that kind of change the narrative from a simple dollar-to-dollar pound-to-pound comparison.

Affinity Substitution Examples

Ryn (00:44:45):
All right. Another example, and let’s actually stay with a connective tissue here, right? Because Solomon’s seal isn’t the only herb that has a good strong affinity for connective tissues. So, if say somebody’s problem was inflammation in the joints, irritation in those tissues, and we were trying to bring that down. And we don’t mind having a bit of a drying and tonifying effect on their system, right? This is somebody with more of a damp constitution. Then an herb that is really well-indicated for that is teasel root. And teasel root, last time I looked recently, is trading at around $124 per pound. Okay. So, teasel root is a fantastic herb for that kind of problem: connective tissues with inflammation, but also some dampness and some stagnation going on. A really, really helpful plant but a little pricey, right? And again, if we’re going to prepare it as tincture somewhere in the similar range to what we talked about, $2-$3 an ounce of tincture if you make a whole big batch all at once, yeah. But if we kind of put that aside and think about yeah, decoction methods and things of that nature. Well, there is another herb that could work really well for similar problems, and that is gotu kola. Gotu Kola is trading at $33, so about a quarter of the cost. Similarly effective for the kind of problem we’ve got at hand. And we can prepare it in water, we can make a tea. In fact, gotu kola is even simpler to prepare as tea because this is one that we can make in an infusion combo instead of a decoction. So, that might remove another element of barrier or constraint for somebody who’s considering to do this. Okay.

Ryn (00:46:34):
One more example about affinity could be in the immune system. So, let’s say all right, all I’m really looking for here is an immune tonic. I want to keep my immune system working effectively, and efficiently, and smoothly and everything. And I’m going to look for some herbs that help me do that. So, I’ve heard chaga is good. I see products at the store, and I see things on Instagram about it and whatever. So, you know, maybe I should try some chaga. But then they discover that chagas pretty expensive, $80, $90 a pound, that kind of a thing. Okay, what could we offer as an alternative? Are you thinking of astragalus? Because I am. Astragalus is a really nice immune tonic. It is going to boost up immunity, and enhance immune surveillance, and help you to have a little better barrier function against things you may encounter in the world. But it’s a lot less expensive, right? So, if that’s all our goal is – general immune support kind of a thing – this is a simple switch, and it’s doing the job you’re hoping for. You can also be consuming it in such a way that you kind of make sure you don’t leave anything behind. And honestly, my favorite way to do that with astragalus is to get the slices and to just chew on them. Chew it until it doesn’t taste like anything and then for like another five minutes. And you can feel pretty confident that you’ve got everything that that bit of astragalus had to offer to you. This is actually much easier than working with chaga. Because if you really want to get everything chaga has, first of all it should be broken up pretty well into small pieces. And then you want to decoct that for days. You want to keep on cooking it until the water is not coming out opaque after an hour of cooking any longer, right? It’ll still have color to it, but if it’s no longer like a black liquid by that point, okay. Yeah, you’ve probably done well by that amount of chaga. But of course a lot of people are not doing that with their chaga, right? You even see little bits of chaga in a teabag that’s going to be in hot water for five minutes. That’s not getting you the effect you want at all, okay?

Ryn (00:48:42):
On the other hand, there are some applications for chaga that astragalus is maybe not all the way there, right? So, especially if somebody is going a lot further in their intention or in their goal, right? Like this person says I’m going to be taking chaga because I’ve looked at some of the studies on particular forms of cancer and the way that people have worked with chaga and extracts of chaga to enhance specific elements of the immune response to that particular kind of cancer. Because I’ve been diagnosed with it, and I did my research. I checked it through. This seems to be really powerful. That’s a circumstance where I wouldn’t be like oh, just try astragalus instead, right? Unless we do the same kind of research and find that astragalus is also just as good for that same specific problem, that same particular kind of cancer, and to activate some of those same immune responders to it, which is unlikely to be the case, right? So, when people are further out on those edges of what they’re doing and what they’re hoping to accomplish with their herb, that’s when we may need to look elsewhere. And we may need to be thinking all right, that part of the protocol should actually stay where it is. What else can we do in terms of other herb recommendations, or even some food things that you’ve been doing, or other aspects like that. Where can we open up some space so that this can be maintained, right? I just want to leave space for that to be a possibility here as well. Okay.

Choosing Herbal Actions & Formulation Solutions

Ryn (00:50:13):
Now actions, sorry, qualities, energetics, affinities, tissues and organs in the body, okay, we can also just be looking for an herb to serve a particular action, right? And a good example I like here a lot is if we just want a dispersive. Something that is going to take some stagnant blood in a given area, and push it all around, and spread it all out, and disperse it, and move it through the body, right? Then this is a good place to look at arnica. Because arnica, especially if you go and you buy good quality, organic flowers again from a reputable, high-quality supplier, arnica can be trading at like $380 a pound, which is kind of a lot, right? Now, they are light and fluffy, and a pound of arnica flowers is a lot bigger than a pound of ginger root, okay? But it is still very, very pricey. And there are some herbs that are equally light and fluffy that can do that same job but are much less expensive. And so my favorite example for that would actually be yarrow. Yarrow is a fantastic dispersive. You can work with it in all of the same ways that you could work with Arnica. By that I mean yeah, you could prepare it in water. Actually yarrow you can drink as tea much better than you can drink arnica. Arnica, you can take a little small amount of things internally. But you know, if we do it in tincture, we’re thinking like 10 drops, not droppersful, not that kind of thing. Yarrow is actually much safer to consume when we’re taking it internally. So, there’s another element of benefit there. But even if we just look at the topicals, a tincture rubbed right into the skin, a liniment, an oil infusion, whatever, yarrow does just as well in those formats as arnica does. It achieves the same end goal of dispersing and moving the blood around. You can certainly argue about potency, right? And maybe we need to apply or to prepare the yarrow preparations twice as strong if we can or apply them twice as often. But even at that, the price difference here is much more than two X. It’s closer to what? It’s closer to 20X, right? So, we’re getting into those kind of ranges. And that means that this is going to be a good trade. This is going to be effective. This is going to be equally convenient. This is going to be much less expensive. And so that’s one that I would very strongly recommend, right?

Ryn (00:52:49):
Looking at least at actions is I think essential when we’re searching for a substitute, and it’s natural in a way, right? As long as somebody has stopped at all and said what am I trying to do with that herb? And not simply been like oh, problem, herb name, right? If you do that, you’re not going to be able to make these kind of substitutes because you don’t really know why you chose that herb. You just have this connection between the name of the problem and the name of the herb, right? And so this is also why it’s important when you’re studying herbalism that you get beyond when there is this problem, you take this plant. And you get further into when there is this problem, you want this set of actions and probably these energetics depending on that individual’s constitution and tissue state pattern. And therefore we can choose this herb to do this job for this constitution and solve this issue, right? That is a much more thorough and helpful way to think about it, not just to make a better recommendation in that given moment, but also to have the capacity to find substitutes.

Ryn (00:53:53):
All right. Okay. there’s often going to be more than one substitute for a given herb, right? Especially when our goals are more general. We’re just looking at their energetic match, or we’re just looking at having a given action come through. And that’s helpful because each herb might not always be as appropriate for this individual as our initial target herb was, right? So, a decent example here could be rose, rose petals specifically, right? So, rose petals, if you want to buy those, we’re talking like $60 to $70 per pound. And you can be doing different things with rose. They might be just like a little sprinkle you put into your tea formulas to look pretty. And there are pretty petal flowers out there, but rose is pretty special, and people can recognize it on site. And so it definitely has a unique capacity in that regard. But look, if you were just like I need an astringent. Oh, rose petals are an astringent, okay. Well yeah, fine, but lady’s mantle is an equally decent astringent, and it’s half the price or less. So, I think that would be a great substitute in that circumstance, okay? But maybe what you were doing with rose was lifting the mood, lifting the spirits. This was the exhilarant effect of rose, right, the neurological and emotional effect of rose. Lady’s mantle doesn’t exactly convey that. We would need to look for somebody else. We might need to look for, actually, if we want an inexpensive one, dandelion flower. Dandelion flower. Now, dandelion flower is inexpensive in that you can go, and you can gather it. And it doesn’t take like a pickaxe in order to dig it out. It’s not an herb you can really buy. And actually I did find a place that I could buy dried dandelion flowers from. They’re fine. But they’re kind of pricey just because it’s not a major herb of commerce, you know? So again, keeping all those aspects in mind, like I’ve been saying this whole time. But if I’m like I want to lift the mood and the spirits, and I’m going to prepare a remedy for this person. Should it be my rose petal tincture, or should it be dandelion flower tincture? You know, that might have a clear answer for you as you go through that. Okay.

Ryn (00:56:04):
There are certain circumstances where I may need to produce a formula in order to match my target herb as closely as possible. So, if I’m thinking about kava, for instance, and I’m trying to match as much of it as I can. Then like I’ve said before, searching for a single herb that does everything kava does is kind of an exercise in frustration. And to have that also be inexpensive, that’s just very unlikely to ever occur. But if we do a little bit of formulation, we can get closer. So, if I think about kava, what am I considering? Okay, so it’s warming. It’s drying. It’s relaxant. It’s an amazing antispasmodic and tension-relieving herb physically for your muscular structures, right, your neck, your back, your jaw. But also mentally and emotionally it relieves that form of tension for you as well. In that regard, it’s anxiolytic. It releases feelings of anxiety that generally manifest with that tension pattern, right? But kava is also a carminative. It’s also a digestive stimulant. And while we’re at it, kava is also a bit of a diuretic and an antimicrobial to the urinary system. So again, if I wanted one herb to do all of those things, that’s kava, right? You’re not going to find another plant that does every single one of those at once. But if we’re a little more selective about which ones we care about, then we can make a formula that does the job.

Ryn (00:57:40):
We could start by saying okay, if I really just want a nice antispasmodic, relaxant herb that has some of that warming capacity in your digestive system, then maybe I start with ginger. Again, a very inexpensive plant. Maybe I go with calamus to give it a little bit of an extra kick, right? Kava does have a degree of bitterness to it. Calamus definitely has that bitterness in it. So, that might be getting us a little bit closer to what kava is up to as far as the digestion goes, and as far as tension patterns in digestion but also more broadly in the body go. With calamus we also reach into the nervine range, right? Calamus is not only a digestive herb. Calamus is also a mental and emotional herb. Calamus can open your perception of the world from tunnel vision out into broad-angle vision. Kava can be very helpful to get into meditative states of mind or more open and relaxed states of being. And calamus helps us to move in those same kinds of directions in a not exactly the same way as kava but in an adjacent way. In a way that might be doing the job for somebody, right?

Ryn (00:58:52):
But if I want to emphasize that anxiolytic piece even further, then maybe I actually need to bring in another layer here. And I could look for an herb that matches in most of these other respects but is going to add a little extra kick in that regard. And so I could think here about black cohosh. Black cohosh is a really nice relaxant, systemic relaxant. Black cohosh is cooling though, right? So, it’s not like a good one-to-one swap for kava if we wanted to keep that warmth, we wanted to match it very well. But if I bring together some black cohosh, and some calamus, and maybe a touch of ginger as well, now I’ve met a lot of the qualities of kava. We still don’t have a urinary disinfectant diuretic, okay? But maybe we can just set that aside. We’re like your guts were all tight and anxious because of your stress and anxiety. That was giving you the clamped jaw. Those are the things we’re working on. This combination of ginger, calamus, and black cohosh can do most oral of what the kava was doing for you, right? So, we’re going to make those kinds of adjustments. All right So, that’s the way that formulation can help us to solve those difficulties of being like this is a pretty good match, but this one energetic quality doesn’t fit. Or we don’t quite have the degree of affinity to that organ system in the body that I was hoping for. Formulation is the way to solve those issues. Just make sure that the cost of the different packets of the individual herbs you want to put together doesn’t turn out to be more than a single packet of the target herb that you add in mind to begin with. As long as we clear that barrier, we should be okay. All right.

Dosing, Format, & Constituent Considerations

Ryn (01:00:40):
Another thing I wanted to mention here, and I guess I have kind of raised this already, is that dosing and format may be different between your target herb and your substitute herbs. So, think back we were talking about Solomon’s seal and seaweeds, and how for the Solomon’s seal you could apply the tincture or liniment right to the tissue. For the seaweed you need to make the poultice and leave it in place for a while, right? Okay. Or internally, yes, Solomon’s seal we take tincture, seaweed we drink decoctions, or soup, or broth, right? So, just recognizing that sometimes the change in our herb or change to a formula of herbs may require us to change the format and sometimes also the dose, right? So, damiana is an inexpensive substitute for the herb dong quai. Dong quai is like $66, $70 a pound. Damiana is closer to $23 a pound. So, about a third of the cost, right? But if our goal is pelvic circulatory stimulation, which could be connected to menstrual issues, or it could be connected to prostate swelling. Or a variety of different things could be bringing that forward for us, right? But we’re like okay, there’s stagnant fluid down in the pelvis. We want to move it around. We know that dong quai can do it. We also know that damiana can do it. But if we compare cups of a tea made properly for each herb or droppersful of a tincture, made it a good ratio for each herb, you generally are going to need more damiana to get the degree of effect you would get from a little bit less of the dong quai.

Ryn (01:02:18):
So, here you’re just basically thinking it through and being like okay, well if I need to take three times as much damiana as dong quai, I’m probably breaking even. And I should just go with the herb that matches better or that the person prefers or maybe has a better energetic match. You know, dong quai is more heating than damiana is, for instance, right? Those considerations might come into play there. But if the damiana is going to be effective at twice the dose of the dong quai instead of three times, or four times, or whatever. Then that actually still comes out… I still come out ahead. I still come out getting a better deal in that regard, okay? So, as long as we’ve thought it through, getting to the real world of what are you actually going to take, how much, how often, for how long. We get to that point in our thinking, in our calculation, in our planning. Then you can feel confident, and you can move forward from there.

Ryn (01:03:15):
Okay. Oh, there is one other consideration that sometimes comes into play when you’re searching for a substitute. And this is constituents, right? So constituents aren’t always going to be what matters most to us or the specificity of them. So, I love the herb monarda. And monarda is a pungent, warming, stimulating herb in the mint family. It’s not as common, not as abundant as plants like thyme, and sage, and oregano, but it’s very similar to them. It’s beautiful. It has a particular flavor to it. I really love to work with monarda, but it is more expensive than thyme or oregano, okay? And if all I want is a warming stimulating herb with a bunch of respiratory affinity, then I can just go with thyme or oregano. Less expensive, probably easier to get, and they’ll totally do the job for my tea, for my tincture, for a steam that I’m going to inhale. Great, right? And so there the differences aren’t significant. They do share a lot of similar chemistry, but it’s not exactly the same. Like the amount of thymol, and linalool, and other specific aromatics does vary between these two. That’s why we can tell them apart by smell and taste, right? But there are some circumstances where you do really focus a lot on one constituent, maybe for a very good reason. Like I want to have a berberine-containing herb in this topical formula that I’m preparing. This is a wound wash or a disinfectant. And this is going to try to work for as many different kinds of infection as possible. And so it’s not just going to be berberine herbs in there. I’m going to get a bit of garlic in the mix. I’m going to get some black walnut. I’m going to get some neem or some henna. Or a variety of other antimicrobial agents are going to get mixed into there, some uva-ursi, some other things, right? And that way I’m going to get a good, broad-spectrum remedy that can attack a lot of different kinds of problems when I don’t quite know what it is. This is going to go into my first aid kit. This is going to go into my travel kit, my hiking kit. I’m going to be ready for whatever comes my way, right? But I do want berberine in there because it is potent. It is special. It has extra activity for certain pathogens. I want to make sure I include some of that in there.

Ryn (01:05:44):
So, I could then go for the most famous berberine-containing herb, which is goldenseal. And I could say okay, well goldenseal is a topical, antiseptic herb because of the berberine content. It’s great, but it’s also very expensive. $300 a pound or more, yeah. So, I could just substitute with barberry, $47 a pound, Oregon grape root, $52 a pound. If you live in Texas, and you’re surrounded by agarita trees, and they’re encroaching on land and growing places people don’t want them. And you have time, and you have energy, and you have tools. You could go out, and you could harvest some of your own, and you could work with that, right? But the point is that you don’t need to choose the most expensive berberine-containing herb when there are others that are one-sixth of the cost or less, right? We can just go with those because that’s where the focus is. That’s fine. Okay. But, but, but, but you might’ve been working with the goldenseal for other reasons, right? And so again, if we’re thinking through that process, we’re like all right. Were you just looking for a topical, astringent antimicrobial, and you weren’t doing this formulation exercise where you do want to hit several different categories of antimicrobial substance in there? You’re just like yeah, I just need something that’s going to kind of like tighten up the tissue and kill off some infection. It’s nothing too extreme or serious, just whatever does the job. Well again, I could do goldenseal topically. I could choose any of my other berberine-containing herbs, and they’ll probably fit the bill. Or I could go in another direction entirely, and I could look at uva-ursi, about $25 a pound. And uva-ursi is both very good at topical antimicrobial effects, and it’s very astringent. So, that could be a decent swap. That’d be just fine.

Ryn (01:07:36):
If you were taking goldenseal, maybe you were taking tincture by mouth because it dries up the sinuses for you, right? You’ve got a drippy, runny nose that just won’t stop. You take 10 drops or 20 drops of goldenseal tincture, and it dries it up for you. No problem. You’re all set. So, in that case, maybe I go with yerba santa, right? A much less expensive herb, $45 something like that per pound. Take it in tea, take a tincture. You will get that astringent effect up into your sinuses. No problem. This is a case where you couldn’t just substitute with any other berberine herb, right? Yerba santa doesn’t really contain berberine. But you wouldn’t just base this on constituent. Because if we look into it, the reason goldenseal astringes your sinuses so much is not berberine. It’s hydrastine. It’s a different alkaloid that’s present in there that’s responsible for that effect. So, we don’t have to stay focused on that chemistry. There aren’t really a lot of other plants that even contain hydrastine to begin with. So, we’d be better off just being like okay, forget chemistry. Just think about action and location, okay? I know I can do the same thing with yerba santa. Fine. Or I could do a steam with sage, and I could steam myself with it. My nose will run while I’m steaming, but afterwards it will dry it out and tighten it up. That would be just fine, right? Okay, so notice the dose may change, right? I might drink a cup of yerba santa tea instead of 10 drops of tincture. The administration method changed there, but also in the steaming example, right? It’s a very different administration. It might make sense, it might work for that individual, or they might hate it, okay? So, all of that comes into play.

Alternative Constituents/Herbs to Do the Same Work

Ryn (01:09:17):
One last thought on berberine herbs, right? Because we’re in this current environment, and because things have gone in the way they have where people are looking at berberine as an herb to improve blood sugar regulation and to combat insulin resistance, and pre-diabetes, and that kind of thing. So here, first off, it’s important everybody understand that the dose of berberine that people are taking for those effects. If you wanted to get that much berberine from a tincture of goldenseal, you would need to consume an entire ounce of tincture. And you would need to do that three times a day to get the equivalent dose of just that chemical berberine that people are taking in the capsules, the berberine sulfate capsules at whatever number of milligrams they are, right? So, you would not want to do that. If you take an ounce of goldenseal tincture three times a day, first off, it’s probably not going to feel great in your stomach because it is going to astringe your stomach mucosa as well. You’re going to get some cramping and some discomfort there. Your sinuses are going to dry out so much, they’re probably going to start to crack and bleed by day two or day three. It’s going to be very, very uncomfortable because of the humoral effects of the whole herb, which are not totally represented in this isolated product, right? So, I just raise all of this because I have had clients come, and they’re like I heard berberine was good. I heard goldenseal has berberine. I started taking goldenseal tincture for my blood sugar. Usually they end up with smaller doses. They take a dropper a couple times a day or whatever. But even at that dose some people are still going to get excessive dryness and excessive tonification.

Ryn (01:10:55):
So, in that case what I would be thinking is okay, we do want to find a less expensive herb. I would prefer to stay with whole herbs and actual stuff rather than going to isolated berberine for you. So, let’s look at some other herbs that can enhance blood sugar sensitivity. Cinnamon is going to be right up at the top of my list there. If you want a whole pound of cinnamon, it’s like $16, not too expensive at all. But cinnamon powder at a dose of like a teaspoon per day is sufficient to move the needle on blood sugar regulation, right? And you can mix that into some food. You can put that over a meal that you’re eating. You could just take the powder, and stir it in water, and slug it right back. There’s different ways we could go about it. Of course, we can prepare tinctures and so on. We can put cinnamon into a combination of a tea that you can drink a significant amount of, right? We’ve got lots of options for that. But it’s much less expensive. It will serve the job. We just had to get away from chemistry. Chemistry didn’t matter that much in the end in this particular example, right? And that’s often the case when we’re working with holistic herbalism.

Ryn (01:12:09):
It is often the case that there may be a particular herb that is famous for some of its chemistry, right? The kavalactones in kava, the hypericin in St. John’s wort, the ginsenosides in Panax ginseng and also American ginseng, Panax quinquefolius. Ginsenosides is actually an interesting one. It could happen that somebody comes to you, and they’re like so look. I heard ginseng is good. I wanted some science on it. And you know, it seems like really most of what’s good about it is these ginsenosides, and there’s a range of them in the plant. And you know, I want to work with that. I think that that’s really going to work for me. But you know, what’s the cheapest product you think is good? And you’re over here thinking there is no cheap ginseng product that’s good. Cheap ginseng products are bad. They’re bad maybe because of poor quality and poor effect, which is what this client’s going to care most about. But they’re also bad because that’s just encouraging people to make poor quality products. They’re probably cutting corners ecologically in terms of sustainability, in terms of social and human rights, the people who gather and harvest that stuff for them. It’s more likely to be adulterated, including possibly with pharmaceutical drugs. We should just stay away from cheap ginseng products, right?

Ryn (01:13:27):
So, what do we do instead? Well, one option is to work with the herb jiaogulan. Jiaogulan is not too pricey. It’s nowhere near the cost of ginseng. It does contain ginsenosides. And that’s not the only reason that it’s been referred to as poor man’s ginseng, right? The other reason is because it has some of the same effects that ginseng has. Serving as what today we call an adaptogen. Enhancing your stress response, your capacity to cope with changes, and stressors, and things like this. And so if that was somebody’s big ask for me as their herbalist, that might be a direction that I steer them in, right? Work with this plant. You’ll get those ginsenosides in. You can see how they actually perform for you, and if this turns out to be the right thing. But if that’s all you want from me today, okay, fine, we can make that kind of connection. So, sometimes that’s possible as well, right? But like I said before, constituents is rarely going to be the big driver of our search for a substitute, okay. So, you know my overarching goal here for you listeners is that you take these ideas. You apply them to your own practice, to your own habits, your own materia medica, the things that you work with most often. And identify what are your own most expensive herbs. And then by action, by energetics, by intention – like what are we trying to accomplish – you can work out these possible alternatives, right? It could be a singular, it could be a formula. But this is something that if you have that foundational training and experience with plants, that understanding of energetics, actions, affinities, all of that, even chemistry sometimes, you’re better able to help people make that kind of substitution than they are for themselves. Until you teach them how to do it, and now they’re going to become able to accomplish that on their own too. And that’s what we really like to get people to, some kind of self-sufficiency or interdependence let’s call it, right?

A Final Analogue Example & the Importance of Accessibility Training

Ryn (01:15:33):
Okay, so we’ve given a few examples as we’ve gone along. We talked about kava, talked about goldenseal. I wanted to raise one other example before we wrap up here. And that’s with schisandra. Okay. So, schisandra is a really interesting adaptogen because it’s got a complicated flavor to it. It’s pungent, sweet, sour, bitter, salty, a little acrid, right? It’s a complex flavor. It’s got a lot going on. The dominant flavor though is sour. And that correlates with the dominant effect of schisandra, which is to be cooling and drying to the body. So, those are the energetics: cooling, drying, and also it’s got a tonifying quality as well, right? So, in addition to being an adaptogen in the general sense of improving your capacity to cope with stress, schisandra specifically is one of the adaptogens that enhances blood sugar regulation, and that can be a really valuable effect. But interestingly, schisandra’s benefits for blood sugar also kind of correlate with the sour flavor. Because a number of other sour herbs that are a bit astringent, a bit diuretic, have that acidity to them, that sourness, they can also be helpful for blood sugar disruptions and helping to serve to normalize that. So again, schisandra can be a somewhat expensive plant, looking at $77, $80 a pound, somewhere around there. And if I say to myself okay, let me set aside this adaptogen label for a little minute, and say the main thing that this person in front of me is searching for is a way to eliminate some extra fluid, to tonify some tissues in their body, and through that to help to improve that blood sugar regulation pattern. Then I could look at staghorn sumac berry. Staghorn sumac berry is about a quarter of the cost, $20-ish per pound. It is sour. It is astringent. And it does have a pretty reliable and palpable effect on insulin resistance, especially with that damp pattern, right? And so that can be a really good substitute, even though it doesn’t quite have that adaptogen capacity to it, right?

Ryn (01:18:10):
Now, if somebody comes back and they’re like well, but I really did need that actually. I am kind of stressed on top of the blood sugar problems, and the fluid retention, and whatever. Then we could say okay, well look, an option here is that we go ahead and combine the staghorn sumac berry together with tulsi. Because tulsi absolutely brings in the adaptogen effect, and it shares the normal glycemic effect that the schisandra had originally and the sumac berry also shares. The tulsi is going to enhance that element, introduce the adaptogenic effect. And now we’ve got a really simple formula – two herbs – that is getting us much closer to the total representation of the original plant. It’s not all the way there, right? Because we don’t really have a strong pungent element in here. There’s some other aspects that start with the flavor of schisandra and carry through. Of course, we’re not matching it on a chemical level, right? But again, intention, system affinity, that kind of thing, we’ve done our job. We’ve met the need with that, right? And we’ve probably cut the cost in half overall. Okay. So, that is the idea. That’s how we go about it. Those are the things we’re thinking of. Just remember to always get through to that moment of in the real world what would you actually take? How much, what format, how long, all that kind of thing. And you’ll be able to give people some good advice. All right?.

Ryn (01:19:36):
Now, like I said up top, this topic is one but not all of the topics that we address in our course Accessible Herbalism. Accessible Herbalism is one of the courses in our Clinical Herbalist program. And I’m saying that simply to point out that I believe that this is a necessity for anybody who wants to be a practitioner. That we at Commonwealth Holistic Herbalism – me, and Katja, and Kenton, and Emmy, and our staff – we do not believe that you are fully trained as an herbalist if you’re not trained in accessibility. And like I was saying earlier, this isn’t only about money outlay. This is about time, energy, community support, ability, and mobility. All of those elements are things that we consider in turn. We think about what the what the common roadblocks and obstacles are, and methods, and strategies, and techniques to help people to navigate around them. And so over the course of our careers, we’ve come more and more to appreciate the importance of this kind of material, these sets of concepts, and skills, and strategies. And so we inserted it right into the Clinical Training program, and said this is essential material. If you don’t know this, you’re not going to graduate. You’re not going to be ready to get out there into the world and really help people. And part of that is admittedly because of seeing folks make recommendations that are not affordable or not sustainably affordable, kind of willy-nilly and not really obviously thinking about these matters at all. Or doing things like I mentioned before, of being like oh, stop taking those turmeric capsules and just dig your own burdock roots instead, right?

Ryn (01:21:32):
And this also extends over into food, right? Like oh, you know, stop buying all packaged food and prepare everything yourself from scratch. That’s great if you have the time, and the energy, and capacity to do that. Or you’ve got support in your family or community, and we can share the load in some ways, right? But that’s not going to work for everybody. So, we do need to have other strategies to recommend about finding affordable food that’s also high quality, right? Again, we’re not going to sacrifice or compromise on that. We’re going to find ways to navigate all the way through it. So, that is the goal of the Accessible Herbalism course. And again, we’ve been working on this for a while. We’ve got a lot of great ideas in there. And like all of our courses, it continually expands as we go along, and we go through time. So, I really hope that you’ll check that out. Like all of our course material, this is primarily video lessons. It is self-paced. You can go at your own time on your own schedule. You do get lifetime access to the current material and anything we add to it in the future. You also get access to our twice-a-week live Q&A sessions. There’s discussion threads in the course. If you have a question, you pop it right in there and get an answer within 24 hours. There’s our student community of course. We’ve got study guides and everything for you. We’ve got assignments so that you can really make sure that you’re not just kind of getting exposed to the material but processing it, metabolizing it, turning it into something real. And we’re there with you the whole way.

Ryn (01:23:03):
So, there’s a link in the show notes, of course, directly to Accessible Herbalism, but that’s the way we teach everything. So, if you are starting out, you want to begin with the Family Herbalist program. You’re looking for some specific information. You want to get our Energetics course or the one on Herb-Drug Interactions. We’ve got a lot to offer over here. So, you can find all of that at online.commonwealthherbs.com, and I sure hope you will. Because I’d love to have you as a student and not just a podcast listener. Oh, that does remind me though, that if you are a podcast listener, and you’ve been for a minute, it does still really help us if you leave reviews, or ratings, or likes and subscribes on YouTube, on Spotify, on Apple podcasts, or wherever it is that you’re listening. I know every single podcast says this to you. We don’t say it every week, but every now and then I want to remind you that in fact it actually is true. It does help us, and we do really appreciate it. So, if you have a moment or two to do that, I would really appreciate that. Thank you very much. Okay. All right. That’s it for this week. We’ll be back soon with some more Holistic Herbalism podcast for you. Until then take care of yourselves. Take care of each other. Drink some tea. And seek out those affordable substitutes. You can do it. Bye.

When we’re choosing herbs to help someone, knowing their medical diagnosis isn’t enough: we don’t choose herbs for a diagnosis. As herbalists, we actually need more information! A medical diagnosis is a specialized vocabulary which creates a shorthand so that people who already know what it means, how it happens, and how to fix it, can speak more efficiently about (whatever it is). It’s not an objective truth, though: it’s a descriptive label that is useful in a specialized context. Herbalism is a different context.

That’s why it’s not very practical to try to look up something like “herbs for neuropathy caused by a herniated cervical disc” – because we can’t actually make that list without leaving gaps large enough to drive a truck through. The name of the problem isn’t enough information for us to choose herbs, we still have to get more data! We need to understand what the diagnostic term means in absolute terms, and we need to know what the person’s experience of that diagnosis is (because not everyone with a certain label has the same experience), and then we need to figure out what herbs or what series of herbs have the actions we need to work toward a resolution.

So here’s how we think that through – taking this example, and asking: what does “neuropathy caused by a herniated cervical disc” mean for an herbalist? Where exactly can we dig into that to make an impact? What other information do we need to allow us to pick the right herbs to support this person?

This process for thinking everything through will work for any problem! It’s all in this episode.

This example came up in one of our live Q&A sessions last week. Those are a perk enjoyed by every one of our students – whether they’re enrolled in a full program like Family Herbalist or Community Herbalist, a single course like Neurological & Emotional Health, or even one of our free short courses such as Herbal Study Tips. Anyone who’s learning from us can ask us questions directly at these sessions, twice a week. And if you can’t make it live, we keep an archive – there are more than 500 archived Q&A sessions for you to look through! (Don’t worry, there’s a searchable index so you can find what you’re interested in.)

Everything we offer is presented in self-paced online video courses, which come with lifetime access to current & future course material, the twice-weekly live Q&A sessions with us, open discussion threads integrated in each lesson, an active student community, study guides, quizzes & capstone assignments, and more!

If you enjoyed the episode, it helps us a lot if you subscribe, rate, & review our podcast wherever you listen. This helps others find us more easily. Thank you!

Our theme music is “Wings” by Nicolai Heidlas.

Episode Transcript

Katja (00:00):
Hi, I’m Katja here at Commonwealth Holistic Herbalism in Boston, Massachusetts. Today on the podcast I want to share with you a clip from one of our live Q&A sessions last week. A student was asking where to find a list of herbs for a specific medical diagnosis. And I was explaining that it doesn’t really work that way. Medical diagnoses are specialized vocabulary that creates a shorthand so that people who already know what it means, how it happens, and how to fix it can speak more efficiently about it, whatever it is, right? So, everybody in a medical environment who is talking about multiple sclerosis, for example, the word multiple sclerosis does not contain all of the information that is necessary to know in order to talk about multiple sclerosis. It’s a label that allows people who already have that information to talk about the problem so that they don’t have to every single time list out every single symptom and all the different details, right? It just makes communication a lot easier in a specialized context, in this case, in medical interactions, right? That’s not bad. It’s not good either. It just is. It’s just a specialized language. It’s a descriptive label. It’s not an objective truth. It is a way of describing a thing that is real, right? But it itself, the label itself, is not what is real. The experience that the person is having is what is real.

Katja (02:02):
So, in order for us to choose herbs that are going to work for a person, that are going to help a person to feel better, improve, whatever, we need to do some translation. We can’t just start with the medical. Well, often we do start with the medical diagnosis. But we can’t start our work there, because that’s not enough for us as herbalists to translate everything into the herbal environment. We need to understand, first off, what does that diagnostic term mean in absolute terms, right? Like when two doctors are talking about multiple sclerosis, whatever it is, what do they understand when they are saying that to each other? We have to know that. And that is because a diagnostic label covers a list of symptoms, but not every symptom is required to achieve that diagnostic label, right? So, some people may have these five symptoms out of 10, and some people may have those five symptoms out of 10. And maybe only two overlap between these two people that we’re imagining. And so it’s really important for us as herbalists to understand not just what the diagnosis means when people in the medical community use that term, but also what the specific experience of the person we are working with is having of that diagnosis. All right. So, then once we understand what is really going on here, we first need to think about what actions can we take to have an impact? And of those actions that we could take, which ones do we want to take? Maybe not everything is on the table, right? Maybe because of costs some of the actions that we have available to us are actually going to be ruled out, or because somebody doesn’t like the flavor, or because of various things. So, we have to think about what can I do to make an impact for this person? And then what do we want to do to of that? Like what subset of that do we want to do? And at that point, we can start to think about which herbs or series of herbs is going to be relevant for this person, right?

Katja (04:23):
This whole process takes some practice, so that’s what I want to talk about today. But before I get too much further into it, because I’m very excited, and I’m just launching right in, I do need to do the reclaimer. And that’s just where I remind you that I am not a doctor, I’m an herbalist and a holistic health educator. The ideas discussed in this podcast do not constitute medical advice. No state or federal authority licenses herbalists in the United States. So, these discussions are for educational purposes only. We want to remind you that good health doesn’t mean the same thing for everyone. Good health doesn’t exist as an objective standard. It’s influenced by your individual needs, experiences and goals. So, keep in mind that we are not trying to present a single, dogmatic right way that you, or everyone, or anyone should adhere to. Everybody’s body is different. So, the things that we’re talking about may or may not actually apply directly to you. But we hope that they’ll give you some new information to think about and some ideas to research and experiment with further. Finding your way to better health is both your right and your own personal responsibility, which does not mean that you’re alone on the journey or that you are to blame for your current state of health. But it does mean that the final decision when you are considering any course of action, whether it’s discussed on the internet or prescribed by a physician, that’s always your choice to make.

Herbalists as Weavers

Katja (05:58):
Okay. So, now that I got that out of the way, the clip that I’m going to share next is an exchange from one of our live Q&A sessions. We have live Q&A sessions twice every week for US students, and then special different times twice a month for students in various other time zones. And then we have specialized live Q&A sessions for the advanced students and stuff like that. Okay, so my point is that we have a lot of live sessions where students have the opportunity to ask us questions directly. And then we work together through the answer until they get to a place where they feel confident and really understand where we want to be going. And also where we feel confident. You know, it’s good to go back and forth on the question to make sure that we really understand what they’re asking as well, so that we get them the information that they need. We love live Q&A because it is an opportunity for us to get to know our students and really to make sure that everybody is getting what they need. Learning online is great in terms of convenience, and being able to do things at your own pace and on your own time, and if you learn best in the morning, or if you learn best at night or whatever else. Our program is self-paced, so it’s really easy for people to fit it into their schedule. But the drawback of online learning is that unless the school is working really hard to have a direct relationship with students, then it can just be a very one-way sort of situation, and we really don’t want that.

Katja (07:44):
So, we have these live Q&A sessions so that students have the opportunity to build those relationships, and they don’t have to feel like they’re alone trying to figure this stuff out for themselves. So, the clip that I’m going to share, the question was the student was working on the Neurological & Emotional Health course. And in that course there is a chapter about neuropathy. But they were looking specifically for help with neuropathy caused by a herniated cervical disc. And there’s not a chapter on that, partially because there just doesn’t need to be. We are going to weave things together, weave threads together. And that’s what we are always doing as herbalists, right? Because in nature there are no herbs out there saying I am the herb for neuropathy, but only when it’s caused by a herniated cervical disc. I’m not going to help with any other kind of neuropathy at all. In fact, there aren’t actually herbs out there saying I can help with neuropathy. Because neuropathy is, again, it’s from that specialized language. So, there are herbs out there who can help with making sure that blood is circulating and lymph is circulating so that all the cells and especially the nerve cells are being nourished and also having the trash removed, right? There are herbs that will help improve the communication of nerves, one to the other, and even herbs that help to build strong and healthy nerve cells.

Katja (09:32):
And so we can take all these different kinds of herbs and figure out which of these apply to a situation that is neuropathy by breaking down what is neuropathy. And so what is the problem and then what is the resolution that needs to happen, right? But then when we’re looking at something a little more specific – neuropathy caused by herniated cervical disc – then we need to think okay. If we’re going to go with the weaving analogy, our fabric is going to have some stripes here, right? Because we’re going to weave together some stuff about neuropathy. We’re going to weave together some stuff about herniated cervical discs. And ultimately we’re going to come up with a complete picture of what is going on for the person, where we can make an impact, and then what herbs we’re going to work with to do that for them, right?

A Q&A Clip as Example: Neuropathy

Katja (10:30):
All right, so let’s listen to the clip, and then I’ll be back to talk about it. I’ve been finishing up the Neurological & Emotional Health course. I haven’t come across herbs to support neuropathy caused by herniated cervical discs. Herbal support for that kind of neuropathy specifically at night to help me sleep without pain waking me up. Would this be a place for wild lettuce and kava? Okay, listen you guys. When we say neuropathy caused by herniated cervical discs, that isn’t enough information actually. So, if we break that down, and we say okay, well what is a herniated cervical disc? So first off, what’s a disc? A disc is a fluid-filled sack that is a cushion in between each vertebrae. And that way no matter how we bend and flex our spine, we never get bone-on-bone creating friction. Bone-on-bone is bad. So, everywhere throughout the body we have connective tissue or whatever – collagen, and cartilage, and all kinds of stuff – that makes sure that the bones are never grinding on each other. And so the disc, a little cushion, it’s kind of like a little marshmallow. Or if you’ve ever been to a Japanese grocery store and had mochi, those little bean cakes, and they usually have some sort of filling inside them. That’s like a disc in your in between. I always think of that when I have one of those. Okay, so the purpose of this disc is to cushion the movement of the vertebrae.

Katja (12:19):
Okay. So cervical, what does that mean? It’s in your neck. This is the cervical spine. You might hear the word cervical and think cervix. They’re two different… It’s just unfortunately named, you know? They’re different. So, the cervical spine in the neck. Okay, what does herniated mean? It means there has been a tear. There has been poking through-ness, right? So, the gel inside, the fluidy stuff inside is not like water. It’s like gel. And so if there is a tear in the disc, then some of that fluid can come out. And it doesn’t really have anywhere to go, and often it presses on a nerve. And that can cause pain, or it can cause numbness, or it can cause all kinds of different symptoms actually. Sort of what’s this? Like buzzing in and out with your nerves. Okay, if you’re at home saying oh Katja, here’s the medical word for that. Stop. We don’t want the medical word. Yes, we should learn them because that makes us educated, and education is good. It’s good for us to understand what people are saying when they talk to us. But for us it is better to use plain speech. Because when we work with other people, it helps them describe what’s happening to them better. And it helps them understand when we describe to them what’s going on in their body. Okay.

Katja (13:57):
All right. So, what’s going on here is that one of the cushions in the neck has a tear and is squishing out some fluid that is interfering with a nerve. And then what’s neuropathy? That is something going wrong with the nerves, right? Okay. So, generally neuropathy is a numbness with the nerves. All right. Although you can also get burning and pain as well. So, the first thing that we would ask this person is, is it burning, is it pain, is it numbness? Just to complete our information. Although it is not thoroughly necessary because all of those symptoms are kind of imaginary. And I’m not saying the person is imagining them. I’m saying that when that nerve gets pushed on, further down the line the nerves don’t know how to interpret that signal, and so they’re doing the best they can. And sometimes you feel pain or burning, but nothing painful has happened, and nothing is burning. It’s just that the nerves don’t know what message to send. And so they’re picking a message and saying something is wrong, and I’m trying to communicate that. Okay?

Causes of Neuropathy & Herniated Discs

Katja (15:29):
So, one other thing that’s really important here to think about is that common causes of neuropathy include poor circulation. Especially when we’re talking about diabetic neuropathy or really any kind of neuropathy, especially in the lower part of the body for a person who’s very sedentary. Okay, poor circulation. Why? Because the nerve cells are not receiving nutrition. So, you know how when you cross your legs, your leg goes to sleep. Or if you sit on your foot, whatever, then your foot falls asleep. That is happening because you are not letting, you sitting on it is obstructing the flow of blood. So, literally those cells are running out of air. They’re running out of oxygen, and they’re kind of like passing out because they don’t have anything to breathe. And okay, that’s a little bit of a funny way to say it, but it’s also totally true. They’re not getting fresh oxygen.

Katja (16:43):
All right. So, when we think about caused by a herniated cervical disc. If we don’t interrogate this further, if we don’t think about what’s going on, then we will never say to that person, tell me about your tension levels in your neck and in your upper back. And we won’t say to this person tell me about your movement habits. Because you can absolutely be sedentary in the upper part of your body. Especially today where people are often on computers or on their devices, and that causes this thing with the neck going forward. When I do this, I am cutting off the flow of blood so that not everything is moving the way that it should in between my body and my head. Ow, that hurts. And also, go ahead and do it. Like really exaggerate it. Okay, not enough to hurt yourself though. And you can feel weird pressure happening in between the bones that is pressing on the discs.

Katja (17:50):
So, when we think that it’s caused by a herniated cervical disc, okay, well now we have to say well how’d you get a hernia there? Well, okay, maybe the person had a car accident, and there was whiplash, right? And so we ask that, and they’ll tell us. But also yeah, maybe it is they have a desk job on a computer, and so eight hours a day they are sitting here like this. And that’s how they pay their bills. So, they have to do this computer job. But if we just look for an herb that will fix neuropathy caused by herniated cervical discs, we will not actually fix the problem. And if the problem was whiplash, okay, well the whiplash happened. It’s not going to happen again hopefully. So, we just need to recover from it. But if the problem is the way that they’re sitting at their computer, no amount of herbs that we give them is going to fix the pain or the numbness that they’re experiencing because they haven’t changed the behavior. They’re continuing to squash those discs. So okay, now also to think about the juice, the gel that has squeezed out of that disc, sometimes it’s a very small amount. And eventually the body takes care of, it takes time.

Katja (19:15):
But sometimes it’s a large amount, and there are people, actually my mom had this situation, where they have to have that removed surgically. And it’s important to know that. Because if you are working with a person who is that person, like so much of the gel has squeezed out that the body cannot recover it. Then again, no matter what herbs you work with, it isn’t going to fix the problem because the problem is too large to fix without surgical intervention. If you don’t know that, you’ll just keep trying and trying, or you’ll get really frustrated. But if you do know that, then you’ll say okay. Have you had an x-ray or any kind of imaging that would show how big the herniation is? Do you have any data on that from your diagnosing doctor? And that is going to help you know how should you approach this. If it’s a huge amount of gel, I mean, you can try with herbs. But you’re probably better off to say oh, it’s that much, and they’ve told you that you need surgery? Maybe that is the right answer, and then we can help restore and repair afterwards. Sometimes as herbalists it’s our job to tell people hey, the doctor wasn’t wrong. You should do what they said, right? Sometimes that is actually the best way to serve somebody and to help them to heal and recover.

How to Support the Body

Katja (20:50):
Okay, well let’s assume that that is not the case. Let’s assume that it’s just a tiny little bit. So, now we think about okay, what do we need to have happen? And now I’m going to pause. And everybody go ahead and think about what needs to happen here. What job does the body need to do to take care of this problem? Because when we figure out what that job is, then we can find the herbs that facilitate that work. So, let’s just all think for like 90 seconds, what work needs to happen to get rid of that gel?

Student (21:31):
Would this be a place for astringent?

Katja (21:35):
Would it? What kind of job are you trying to do with an astringent?

Student (21:39):
Maybe to like suck it back in?

Katja (21:43):
It’s probably not going to suck back in.

Student (21:45):
Get dried up?

Katja (21:46):
If it dries up, we go from squishy gel to something hard. And then that’s going to be even more difficult to break up. Once something gets hard, that’s hard. And it’s going to push harder, like push more solidly on the nerve when it becomes hard. Plus, this person must have tension in their neck. There’s really no way for this to happen without tension. So, whether it’s whiplash, or whether it is their posture at work, or whatever else, there’s tension there. And so although your idea about astringents makes sense. I see how you got there, right? Because there’s fluid, and that fluid shouldn’t be there. Let’s get rid of it, let’s suck it away. We have to think about where is it going to go. And if it dries out, is it just going to be… You know how when you have a lot of snot? And then it dries out, and you get a really hard booger, and it hurts in your nose? If you have kids in the room, I don’t know what to tell you. You can just tell them that we’re learning about boogers tonight. But you know what I’m talking about? Like while it was still drippy snot, you could blow it out of your nose. But once you get that really hard booger, yeah, you still have to blow it out of your nose, but it like hurts. And then you are trying to get it out with the handkerchief, and it feels like it’s scraping on the inside of your nose, right? Okay, so we can think about that, and that’s such a good example. If you’re like I don’t know, maybe an astringent. And then think about well, where can I imagine that happening? Oh okay, well what about snot? Snot is fluid. If I dry that up, then what happens? Either it gets stuck in the sinuses, or I get sharp boogers. Okay, so that kind of an exercise can help you to think. Because you might be like well, I don’t really know what goes on with a disc because I can’t see it. So, if you think about something that you can see, that helps. Okay. So, we’re not going to do astringents, even though it was logical for you to think about that. But we thought it through, and we said no, no, no. I don’t think that’s a good idea. All right, what other suggestions do we have here?

Katja (24:15):
We have Cindy saying move the fluid. Casey also something that supports lymphatic flow. Cassie is saying thinking about circulatory stimulation to get blood flow to the area and lymphatic to help move the stagnant fluid away. Cindy saying maybe also relaxants as well to facilitate the lymphatic and circulatory stimulants. You guys, you got it. That is the answer. Move the lymph, move the blood, and yes, put some relaxants in there for sure. And we can do this topically. We can do it internally. And we should do it a lot, like really regularly. And then the other thing that we need to do is we’ve got to go back to evaluating what caused this in the first place. And if it wasn’t whiplash from a car accident, or a subway accident, or wherever they got whiplash, but it is in fact something from their daily life, like repetitive stress kind of injury. Then we also need to talk to them about changing that and helping them to build in cues. Like whether it’s a chair that goes all the way up to their head, and so they feel the head against the chair. Or there is a device, it’s called Upright GO. And it is this little thing that buzzes. It’s like on a necklace, but the necklace is backwards. And it has a sensor in it that tells when you’re starting to slouch, and it buzzes just like a cell phone. It buzzes against the back of your neck to remind you oh, I’m slouching. Right? Because you know, if you have that habit, you don’t even always know that it’s happening.

Katja (26:04):
And I need to say that as I’m saying all this stuff, oh yeah, I slouch all the time. You watch the videos, you know that I slouch. And so none of this is a judgment, this is just our culture. Our culture involves us sitting like this a lot, or like this, or like this, right? And so we have to spend a lot of effort doing the counteraction. And so I love the kind of solution where there’s something that will tell you oh hey, you’re starting to slouch. Oh right, okay, I can sit up. Oh you’re starting to slouch. Oh, I can sit up. It’s just like it helps you to deal with the problem. And so while we are trying to help dissolve the gel and move it out, the body’s already working on that. That’s what the lymphatic system is for. But we are helping the lymphatic system to move more strongly in that direction. And we’re relaxing the muscles so that everything can flow better, and we are changing the habit so that we don’t continue to create the problem.

Breaking Down Diagnoses & Factoring in the Individual

Katja (27:19):
Okay. Wow. I don’t know when I started talking about this, but it certainly was like 15 or 20 minutes ago. And all that for just something that medically we say neuropathy caused by herniated cervical discs. Remember medical diagnoses are shorthand. The purpose of a medical diagnosis is to quickly communicate information between two people who understand what they are talking about. And so two doctors, when they say herniated cervical disc, they already have a very clear picture of what that is and what can cause it. But we don’t always, like if you’re just a regular person, you don’t necessarily have all that because you don’t have that training. You have other training so that you can do your job, but you don’t necessarily have that training. And so that’s why it’s so important for us when we see medical words. It’s not like they’re wrong or bad. They are a language. They’re a specialized language, and it is useful to learn it. But when we want to then do work as herbalists, we need to break the whole thing down and think about it in our terms so that we understand the actions that we are looking for, and we can find the herbs who do that action.

Katja (28:47):
Okay. So, I hope that process made sense for you, and that the discussion helped you think about how you would think about whatever kinds of problem. It doesn’t have to be neuropathy from a herniated cervical disc. That same process could be used for any problem that you’re trying to consider. So, you can consider that conversation a template that you can follow whenever you’re working on a health problem that you are not actually sure how to approach it. And I also want to make some notes about the conclusion to this question because that discussion is not the end of the story, right? I never really in that discussion, we never really got information about the person experiencing this problem. But if I were really working with that person, then I would need to be thinking about some additional things. And I want to list them here for you so that you can add them to this like template way of thinking, right?

Katja (29:53):
So, for example, many herbs that stimulate lymphatic function end up having a drying effect. And that’s unlikely to be a problem for a person with a body like mine. I have a damp and stagnant constitution. So, what that means is that my body holds on to water and has a tendency towards water retention and even in extreme times just a little bit of edema. But puffiness at any rate, right? And so in my body, if I’m going to work with a bunch of herbs that stimulate lymphatic function, I don’t really need to worry about that drying effect. For me that actually would probably be fairly comforting. And actually as a secret or not a secret at all, I work with lymphatic stimulants almost every day because that is comfortable for my body. It is really helpful for me to have herbs that are reminding my body that stagnation is not actually the answer. That we need to keep all the fluids flowing. But if this person with this neuropathy had a really dry constitution, and often they felt a little dehydrated, then building a formula for them that focused on lymphatic function could create some discomfort in their body. Because they’re already dry, and most of these herbs are going to end up creating dryness as well. So, if that was the case, then I would need to compensate for that with some moistening herbs. It’s fine to work with lymphatic stimulants even in a person who’s dry. We just need to make sure that we don’t leave it at the dryness. That we put moisture back into the system.

Katja (31:53):
Because if we are trying to move fluids in a very dry person, this is like when your sinuses are congested and dried out at the same time. You know what I mean? It’s like you can’t blow your nose. It’s all stuffed up in there and also totally dried up like paste or concrete, and it won’t come out. So, if we are trying to move fluids in a dry situation, we may need to add some moistening herbs just to get enough moisture in there so that we can move anything at all. Or they might not be that extreme. They might not be that dry, but the herbs that we give them could create that level of dryness. And so we want to be putting in those moistening herbs so that we don’t create that situation. Or they might have a body like mine, and it wouldn’t be a problem, right? But so this is why the person that we’re working with, we can’t know exactly what herbs we’re going to choose until we know the person that we’re working with. Because we have to find out okay, well these are the ideas I have. Oh, but you’re really dry, so I need to add moistening actions to my ideas, right?

Additional Adjustments for Personal Energetics

Katja (33:16):
All right, let’s have some other adjustments that I might make. I would need to take into consideration whether this person runs hot or cold when I’m choosing relaxants. We talked about relaxants in that discussion. And so for example, let’s say this person is in perimenopause, and they are prone to frequent and uncomfortable hot flashes. Well, ginger is probably not going to be the best choice for trying to relax the area and certainly not if we’re going to do that internally, right? Because ginger is going to do that relaxation by adding heat into the area, and this person probably does not want any heat added, right? So, I would be better off choosing an herb like skullcap, which has a relaxing effect but is cooling overall. It doesn’t bring any heat into the system. And so for that person with hot flashes, they would probably appreciate skullcap way more than they would enjoy working with ginger. But if this person typically feels really cold, or if they work in an office where the air conditioner is always on, and it’s like too cold. Then that in itself, that coldness is increasing the amount of tension that’s happening. Because when we’re cold we tense up. We shiver. We kind of huddle ourselves together. And that reaction just to being cold, especially since we’re talking about a problem in the cervical spine. And that area is where we also are hunching when we’re cold, right? So, in that case, in order to create relaxation in those muscles, we need to warm them up. We could give them all the skullcap in the world, but it still probably wouldn’t relax the area because it doesn’t address the reality that they are cold, right? Okay.

Katja (35:30):
So, there’s certainly more adjustments that I would make, but those are two really good examples that would get you thinking about what other things do I need to take into account when I get to the point of actually choosing the herbs I want to work with, right? Okay, well if this kind of herb nerding out is right up your alley, then you should come learn with us. You might like the Neurological & Emotional Health course, which covers all kinds of nerve stuff, including general neuropathy but not herniated cervical disc neuropathy. But that’s okay because now you know how to think through that. And that’s going to be true in all of our courses. We do cover a lot of different health problems that people are familiar with. And we break them down into these kinds of patterns so that you can build up confidence in doing this exercise. That way when you come across something that you haven’t studied, you can still build your approach to that problem from the ground up by going through this process. By figuring out what is this person experiencing, like what does the diagnosis mean? Yes, but then what are they experiencing? What actions could I take to impact that in a beneficial way? And then of those actions, what am I going to actually do, right? All right, so all of our courses also come with access to our twice a week live Q&A sessions, and this is what they’re like. We work through every question you have up close and personal. And that way when you are working on the courses, you also have the live support so that you know that you’re building your skills, and that your skills work, and that you are going in the right direction. You don’t have to just be like, well, I think I got it, I’m not really sure. You can know for sure because we are working with you the whole way.

Katja (37:29):
All right, so next week Ryn is going to be talking about accessible herbalism and specifically about finding affordable analogs for expensive herbs. You know, some herbs cost more. But if you can find an analog or a pair of herbs that will have the same action. And the pair of herbs still is more affordable – or more accessible in your area because it grows wild or whatever – than that one expensive herb, you can do the same work for less money. So, this is a really important skill for any herbalist. First off, because you-yourself and me-myself, we do not have unlimited budgets, right? But then also if you work with people in your community or professionally as a clinical herbalist, you’re going to have people with all kinds of budgets. Some people can afford the more expensive herbs, and other people don’t have the budget for that. So, the more that you can be flexible, so that you can get the same work done with multiple different approaches, then the more that you’ll be able to serve your community. Until then, this is the part where Ryn would say take care of yourselves. Take care of each other. Drink some tea. And hopefully I’ll see you soon at a live Q&A session. Bye-Bye.

Plant ID apps are helpful (when they’re accurate), but there is one drawback – they make it harder to learn plant ID for yourself. But there are ways to combat that so that you get good at plant ID – without having to memorize a ton of stuff.

It’s summer! Now is the time to be out there practicing with your plants. Yes, there are lots of apps that will try to identify plants for you, but this is about skill development – because when you know, you know. Working through the process of observation and identification isn’t just a one-time thing, like sending a photo through a plant ID app – it builds and strengthens the pathways in your brain that you use to do the job. So let’s get out there and be really looking at plants!

In the Olden Times, when you wanted to identify a plant, you’d need a guide book. Each one is a little bit different, but usually there’s a “key” to help you sort through all the possibilities and narrow in on a target. These start with distinct patterns, like opposite vs alternate leaf arrangement. Then you might look at the leaf edges, to see if they’re serrated, smooth, or something else. At some point you’ll look at the flowers, too: are they symmetrical? How many petals, and what color? All these details will help you to exclude some plants (or groups of them), so the set of plant descriptions & pictures you need to look at gets smaller and smaller, until you have a manageable number to work with.

So that’s how you’d use a plant ID guide, but notice something here: it all starts with observation. Even if you don’t know what “pinnate” or “glabrous” means, you can observe features of your plant and recognize its patterns.

In this episode, we’ll demonstrate the observation process for you, and you can play along! We go outside and describe a plant we know and love, starting with its leaves, stems, flowers, and other clear features. But we won’t show it to you until the very end. Can you figure out who we’re talking about, before we show it to you? Notice the timestamp when you have a guess.

Even if you don’t recognize it until we show it to you – or even after we do – it’s the process, the attention, and the habit of close looking that we really want to instill in you today. The more you practice observation, the better you’ll get at plant ID.

Wanna learn more techniques to help you with plant identification, as well as with learning herbalism in general and retaining the stuff you’re studying? Grab the free Herbal Study Tips course! This fun course is designed to make all your learning – whether that’s with us, from other teachers, from books, or from the plants themselves – more exciting and effective.

Like all our offerings, this is a self-paced online video course, which comes with free access to twice-weekly live Q&A sessions, lifetime access to current & future course material, twice-weekly live Q&A sessions with us, open discussion threads integrated in each lesson, an active student community, study guides, quizzes & capstone assignments, and more!

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Our theme music is “Wings” by Nicolai Heidlas.

Episode Transcript

Katja (00:17):
Hi, I’m Katja.

Ryn (00:18):
And I’m Ryn.

Katja (00:19):
And we’re here at Commonwealth Holistic Herbalism in Boston, Massachusetts.

Ryn (00:22):
And on the internet everywhere thanks to the power of the podcast.

Katja (00:25):
Woo-Hoo.

Ryn (00:26):
Yeah.

Katja (00:27):
I’m so excited we’re together today on the pod.

Ryn (00:28):
Here we are. We exist.

Katja (00:31):
We exist. We exist together. Today I want to talk about those plant ID apps. You probably have one on your phone right now or maybe more than one. You’ve probably used one at some point, because you’ve probably been out in the world and said what plant is that?

Ryn (00:51):
Don’t worry, you’re not in trouble. But we do have some thoughts on the limitations of apps. And not only in the sense of sometimes they’re wrong, which is true. It’s true, yeah. But actually we’re thinking about something on kind of a different level today.

Katja (01:10):
Yeah. And that is like use the app if you want to. We’re not going to tell you not to do that. But the thing is that the apps, the plant ID apps, having that in your pocket all the time takes away your opportunities to get really good at plant id. And so how do we solve that problem? It’s a handy tool when they’re right. They’re not always right. But the better you are at plant id, the easier it is for you to know whether they’re right or not, right?

Ryn (01:46):
Yeah. The better you’re able to use the tool effectively.

Katja (01:49):
Right. Right. Right. So, yeah. Well, you know, before we just launch off too much, because I have so much to say about that, let’s just get our reclaimer in here real quick so that we don’t forget it.

Ryn (02:01):
Yeah. That’s where we remind you that we are not doctors. We are herbalists and holistic health educators.

Katja (02:07):
The ideas discussed in this podcast do not constitute medical advice. No state or federal authority licenses herbalists in the United States, so these discussions are for educational purposes only,

Ryn (02:18):
And we want to remind you that good health doesn’t mean the same thing for everyone. Good health doesn’t exist as one objective standard. It’s influenced by your individual needs, experiences, and goals. So, please keep in mind we’re not attempting to present a single, dogmatic right way that you need to adhere to.

Katja (02:34):
Everyone’s body is different. So, the things that we’re talking about may or may not apply directly to you. But we hope that they’ll give you some new information to think about and some ideas to research and experiment with further.

Ryn (02:45):
Finding your way to better health is both your right and your own personal responsibility. This doesn’t mean you’re alone on the journey, and it doesn’t mean that you’re to blame for your current state of health. But it does mean that the final decision when considering any course of action, whether it was discussed on the internet by your favorite holistic herbalist, or prescribed by your favorite medical physician, either way that’s always your choice to make.

How We ID’d Plants Before Apps

Katja (03:07):
Okay. So, if we’re thinking about plant identification, and apps, and whatever. And if we’re going to talk about why you should get good at plant id, and also how you can do that. Don’t worry, that’s coming also. Then I think one of the first things to consider is how did people identify plants before we had apps in our pockets that you could just take a picture and identify the plant? And we had field guides. We had little pocket guides, which this is. I mean, it’s a thick book, but it is quite portable actually. And these guides, all of them are different. This is the Peterson’s Field Guide to Medicinal Plants and Herbs of Eastern and Central North America. Third edition, if you want to get really real. I particularly like this one because it has photographs. A lot of the field guides have line drawings. Those are also good. But I do, this one… We have a lot of different ones, and this one is my favorite just because I do like the pictures. Now, you’ll see here it also has lots of words, right? Those are descriptive qualities. So, this is what used to happen. You would look at your plant, and then there’s a way, it’s called a key, that you can look up and say well, it has this kind of leaf, or this kind of flower, or whatever. So, that if there was a plant you didn’t know, it would tell you okay, look here and see if you find your plant.

Ryn (04:51):
Yeah. Many of these field guides have a different approach or a different method for helping you sort it through. It’s often a kind of a choose your own adventure set to begin with, right? And it starts with like okay, are the leaves arranged opposite, or are they alternate up to stem? If it’s A, go to this section next. If it’s B, go to this section next. And you kind of go through, and you sort of narrow down from some kind of top-level features to some more fine features. And then at some point it will say all right, go look at these pages and just check out the descriptions. Look at the line drawings or the photos that are on there. Find the one that seems closest to what you’ve got. And then if you want to go all the way, at some point you’re going to start to need to measure things. Or in some cases to look at something with a little handheld magnifying lens or something like that.

Katja (05:39):
You know what though? A lot of plants you’ll identify before you get that far. It’s really you get that far if it’s like okay, there are two plants that are very, very similar, and I’m trying to differentiate. And sometimes those two plants are even related to each other.

Ryn (05:54):
Right. Because sometimes it’s not necessary for our purposes as herbalists, because once you’ve identified that this is Solidago, you are good to go, right? You’re like okay, I’ve got goldenrod, and I am happy to work with that. Or I am going to do my next step of assessment about whether I want to harvest this patch with my senses. I’m going to taste this goldenrod and be like oh, this is a really good aromatic stand of goldenrods. I’m not a hundred percent sure on their species, but I know that it’s got the aromatic quality that I was hoping for. As opposed to these other goldenrods which are beautiful but really, really bitter. And that’s not the kind of goldenrod that I want today, right? So, yeah.

Katja (06:37):
Right. But so, okay. There was a system in place before we had apps, but now there are apps that are doing that for you. And it is handy. It is right in your pocket. But the thing is that in order to use the books, the old system, which isn’t really that old. In order to use the books, you had to also use your brain. Every time that you looked up a plant in a book, you were also doing the exercises that would make you better able to recognize that plant the next time. Which is you were looking closely. You were observing how are the leaves, how is the stem, how is the flower? And you had to do that in order to look it up. But in the app you just take a picture, and then the app just gives you an answer. And you kind of have to scroll through and decide which one you think is right. But there’s nothing going into your head except the word of the name of the plant. And it’s harder to remember that.

Manual Plant ID Improves Retention

Ryn (07:54):
Yeah, it’s true. It’s true. So, the practice of the close observation of identifying whether we’re in column A or column B, right? About different features on the plant, the leaf arrangement, the leaf shape, the edges of the leaf on the outer part. The number of petals on the flower if you can see them or count them, the color of them. Like all of those elements you are thinking through them as you go through the key, and as you sort out, and you try out a page. You read a description, you match it to what you’re observing. You’re always coming back to what do I see? With the app it’s more like what does my camera see? What does the robot who’s interpreting my photo think this looks most similar to from its database of other photos that have been tagged and labeled. And the better one is kind of like verified by some expert or some people who really know what they’re up to. And so that’s more reliable, right? But a lot of that processing, that decision making is happening outside of your head. And again, it’s not the end of the world, but it does mean that there’s less happening inside of your head. There’s less mental activity going on. There’s less involvement, and therefore there’s less learning.

Katja (09:10):
Yeah. So, a lot of students talk about how am I going to remember all this stuff? There’s so much to learn. How will I remember it all? This is one of the ways. Because if you look up your plant, then you’re spending a lot of time making the pathway to the information. Like you look at the plant, and you say okay, I need to know what kind of leaf it has so that I can figure out where to go in the thing. So okay, what kind of leaf? I’m looking, I’m looking. Okay, it’s got lumpy bits on the outside, and it has a vein in the center. And it’s maybe a little bit hairy. And you’re coming up with all these descriptions. And then oh, okay, now I have to figure out what the flower looks like. And now I have to… And every step of the process is reinforcing the pathway to the location in your brain where you’re putting that information. Literally, like when people walk across the grass a lot, and they make a pathway. Like if you do it once, you don’t see that. Like maybe you see it for a minute while the grass is pushed down, but then a couple hours later that pathway is gone. Does that sound like your brain? Right? But if you go on that path a lot, it wears it down. And eventually the grass doesn’t grow back there, or it does, but it stays like really… You know? And that path is visible every time you come back. That’s what we want to happen in our brain.

Ryn (10:41):
Right. And I mean part of this is about what is our goal for using the app or identifying the plant that I found, right? If my goal is literally just I want to know what that is right now. Then okay, the app, if it’s trusty, and if you think it’s a confirmed identification. Fine, great. You’ve accomplished your goal for the moment. But if your goal is to learn and to be able to recognize that same plant when it’s growing in another area or when you encounter it somewhere else. Or if it’s your goal to just get better at the process of plant identification in general. Then I’m sorry, you actually have to go through the process of plant identification in order to get good at it, right? It’s like learning anything at all.

Katja (11:22):
But also it’s good actually because when you are doing the process, you are also in your brain doing the process of retention. But if you use the app, you are procrastinating the work of retention. You’re pushing that off for later. So, you have the answer now, but you don’t have the retention of the information now. You’re going to have to do that work later one way or another. So, it’s almost like a time saver if you have the book with you. And like okay, probably you always have your phone with you, and maybe you don’t have the book with you in that one moment. But it’s like 20 bucks, you know, or you can probably get it cheaper used. And it’s not that big or heavy. It’s portable.

Ryn (12:14):
I mean, yeah. Even going through the process of looking at the plant, and working through a key, and figuring out what are some distinctive features that allow me to go to column A or column B or whatever, however it’s arranged. That actually would make you better at using the app. Because you would be like okay, I’m not just going to try to grab any picture of the plant or whatever picture I happen to get. But look, this particular plant has fuzzy leaves. I’m going to make sure that that’s clear in my photo so that it gives better data to my robots, right?

Katja (12:54):
Yes, yes, yes.

Ryn (12:55):
So, like, these things can feed into each other in a way that can be helpful. Yeah.

Plant ID Requires Careful Observation

Katja (13:00):
So, okay. You might be thinking all right, I’m sold. I should probably try the book method sometimes. That will help me remember. So, I do want to just say a few words on this, which is that when I was first learning to be an herbalist, I thought that plant identification was so hard and that I was never going to learn it. And now I can do it at 60 miles an hour on the highway. Absolutely not entirely safe if I’m the one driving. But fortunately he drives most of the time, so it’s okay. But my point here is that you are going to be good at this if you just do it a little bit at a time and be consistent with it. I promise you, you are going to be good at it, even if you think right now that it is the hardest possible part of herbalism, and you’re never going to learn it. Yeah.

Ryn (14:03):
Yeah. And again, each guide that you work with is going to be a bit different from others, right? First of all they’re going to be regionalized. And if you’re looking at wild plants, then you’re going to want to get a guide for your region, right? If you’re in Arizona, then this guide for Eastern and Central US is probably not going to be super helpful for you, right? And so because of that, what we want to show you is more about observation in general than it is about following the specific key from this guide or from another one that we like to work with, right? Because the skill of seeing a plant and not just stopping there and being like a green thing or a plant with a purple flower. But saying what do I see when I pause, when I go down to the plant level, and I look at it from where it’s growing? What do I see if I spend a minute, a whole minute – put a timer on it if you need to – looking just at this leaf and then another minute looking just at the flower, right? Shape, color, symmetry, arrangement, edges, all of that kind of stuff. That is what is most important to cultivate. That enables everything else to happen.

Katja (15:13):
Okay. You said spend a whole minute looking just at the leaf. And you might be thinking when you see it, you see it, right? But the thing is that’s not actually true. There’s a lot of visual information for your brain to process. And so actually the longer you look at it, especially if you look with curiosity. If you look and think what else do I see? What else do I see? The more that you actually will see that you did not see when you first looked at it. Yeah.

Ryn (15:47):
One way to trick your brain into that degree of attention is to either literally or imaginatively say what if I was drawing this, right? Because when you draw it, you’re like oh, wait. You look at it. You sort of draw it. You’re like oh, no, no, it’s actually not quite that sharp of a triangle. It’s a little more broad and open. Okay, I’ve got to change how I drew this, right? So, the more precise you try to be about that, again, even if it’s just in imagination. Like if I was to close my eyes, can I redraw everything that I just observed about the shape, the bumpiness, the curves, the way the veins move? That is a good way to kind of get yourself into that type of attention.

Katja (16:26):
Drawing it is really valuable. Even if you think you can’t draw, it doesn’t actually matter. It is the process of your brain trying to interpret what you looked at and then trying to output that, right? Because you’ve got the input, so that’s passive. But then your brain is trying to actively turn that into output. And it doesn’t matter if the picture ends up being beautiful, and you hang it on your wall. It matters that you are shifting the information from passive input to active output. Again, that is like one more level of helping you retain that information so that you literally no longer have to even worry how am I going to remember it? You literally just automatically remember it because of this process. Yeah.

Ryn (17:20):
All right. So, maybe we’ve convinced you that this is a great practice, but why don’t we do a demo? Why don’t we go outside, and find a plant, and give it our attention and our observation for a while? And see if we can figure out who it is and see if you can figure out alongside with us.

Katja (17:36):
Yeah. So, if you’re listening with your ears only, don’t worry. We’re going to be super descriptive. And so you can see if you can guess the plant at some point in the process, at the very end we’re going to tell you what plant it is. And if you are watching this, if you are listening with your eyes, ’cause you’re watching this as a video we’re not going to show you the plant until the end . So, you also will be able to see if you can guess the plant as we go along. And if you don’t know what plant it is, that’s okay. We’re going to show you at the end. So, it’s going to be totally great.

A Plant ID Demo: Leaves & Stem Shape

Ryn (18:10):
All right, let’s do it.

Katja (18:13):
All right. Well, here we are outside. This is take two because the first one it started raining.

Ryn (18:20):
Welcome to New England.

Katja (18:22):
Yeah. But here we are with a plant that you can’t see. We’re going to show it to you at the end, but first we’re just going to spend some time looking at it and describing it. So, I’m going to start off and say that it has leaves that have very scalloped edges. They’re not sharp like a serrated knife. They’re very roundy like somebody’s decorative, humpy-edged things.

Ryn (18:57):
Some lacy things. Yeah. When we talk about the edges of plants, we can talk about teeth, even if they’re not sharp teeth but actually soft, round-edged teeth. I guess maybe a cow would have them, and they would squish their grass when they chew it up, and it’s that kind of thing. But yeah, so not sort of like triangular shapes all around the outside of the edge, like when you have the fancy scissors when you’re in kindergarten. And some of them make little triangle edges when you clip the sides. But these ones are the roundy edges that go like that. Or like if it’s a child, and they draw a cloud, and it has like the round edges around the outside of the cloud. It’s kind of like that.

Katja (19:39):
Now, these scalloped edges are quite regular. Like each bumpy scallop is like the same size. I noticed that. But the overall shape of the leaf is kind of triangular, or heart-shaped, or in some of these it’s kind of kidney-shaped.

Ryn (20:07):
Yeah. There’s a range.

Katja (20:10):
But there is kind of a point that shows you where the middle is.

Ryn (20:14):
Yeah. And there is a vein that runs straight up the middle of the leaf to that point also. That kind of helps you to see it. So yeah, there’s a range of leaf shapes. And this is also, by the way, normal when you’re looking at plants and doing plant ID that the largest, oldest leaves on a given plant specimen might have a bit of a different shape than the youngest, newest leaves. Also you could have one plant over here that has grown all the way up, and it has leaves all the way up to the top. And another one that is so far just a couple of leaves poking out of the ground. And so they might also have a different shape to them. But yeah, somewhere between an overall triangle silhouette with those scallopy edges on it all the way over to one that’s kind of like a kidney bean, so a couple of curves.

Katja (21:08):
So, the leaves always come in pairs. And the leaves are directly across from each other in their pair. So, the stem goes through. And on one side there’s one leaf and 180 degrees, like a mirror image, is the other leaf.

Ryn (21:29):
Yeah. In botanical terminology this is opposite leaf arrangement as opposed to alternate. And this is a good one to learn and to have in mind because it’s often a starting point for sorting out which major groups of plants your specimen is going to be in. So yeah, opposite leaf arrangement is what we see here on this one.

Katja (21:52):
And then when I look at the stem… Oh wait, one more thing I noticed about the leaf here is that when I touch it, it’s thicker than it really looks. And especially along the bottom side there’s a lot of little hairs.

Ryn (22:09):
You can feel them.

Katja (22:11):
You can feel them, yeah.

Ryn (22:13):
You can see them too.

Katja (22:14):
They’re not prickly or stingy. It’s more like if you regularly shaved some part of your body. And then you didn’t shave today, and you get that stubbly bit. It’s like that.

Ryn (22:29):
Yeah, the hairs aren’t too long. They’re not too firm. They’re not so dense that they give it a silvery look underneath the way it happens with some plants. There’s a little bit of a change though in the color of the upper face of the leaf to the lower leaf because the hairs are more present on the bottom.

Katja (22:48):
Yeah. Like the top part of the leaf is darker. The bottom part of the leaf is not white or silver, but it is lighter than the top part of the leaf.

Ryn (22:57):
Lighter green color, yeah. And on the leaf you can see multiple branching veins. Mostly the major ones kind of originate at the point where the body of the leaf meets the stem, and then they kind of branch and spread out from there. There’s like the major, the deeper veins that are present. And then from that there’s sort of a network that spreads out like a network of blood vessels, or a network of roots, or any other of the many natural manifestations of that kind of thing that we could see.

Katja (23:28):
Some of these plants have a little bit of a purple edge along the border, the scalloped border of the leaf, especially as you get closer to the top of the plant. That’s doesn’t seem to happen as much at the bottom. But towards the top the leaves do get purply, reddish tinge around the edges.

Ryn (23:58):
Yeah.

Katja (23:59):
Otherwise it’s fairly uniformly a medium green color.

Ryn (24:05):
Okay. Stem?

Katja (24:08):
Yeah, the stem. So, this stem is also stubbly, like it didn’t shave today.

Ryn (24:17):
Yep. You can feel it.

Katja (24:20):
And the stem is really square. And I love things that are square in nature. Because lots of times you’ll hear people say oh, everything in nature is round, as if it’s some kind of criticism on things that are square and have angles. But if sometimes you feel like you’re square and have angles, that’s okay, because this plant also has a very square stem with super-defined, 90-degree angles.

Ryn (24:53):
This is easiest to feel rather than to see. To some extent I can look at that one over there, and I can be like yeah, I see your square shape, you. But if you’re ever in doubt, just take the stem between your fingers. And even better is to roll it back and forth a little bit. And there you can really feel it.

Leaf Node Spacing, Petioles, & Flower Placement

Katja (25:09):
You can really feel it. Yeah. Now, when we look at how the leaves are attached to the stem, there’s the opposite pair, so the mirror image, the opposite pair. And then there’s really kind of a lot of distance, like an inch or an inch and a half of distance until the next leaf of just naked stem until the next leaf pair.

Ryn (25:39):
Yeah. This particular plant, sometimes there’s… Well, and actually for a lot of plants there can be variation in how much space you get between a node, a place where there’s – in this case – a pair of leaves together. Depending on the growing conditions, and how often it gets cut down if it’s a plant that grows back fast, or what’s growing next to it. If there’s like tall plants around the plant will try to reach and to grow itself taller. And so you’ll find more of a stretched out look in between each leaf node.

Katja (26:13):
This is pretty uniform though. They all seem to have about an inch and a half. Or there’s one that has more like two or two and a half inches. But it’s pretty, even the smaller ones and the taller ones have fairly uniform… It’s not like there’s one that has a lot of density, and then some of the other ones are spread out. They’re pretty uniformly with these gaps in between of naked stem in between the leaves.

Ryn (26:47):
Yeah. Another thing you notice when you look at the leaves closely is that they have a leaf stem. So, rather than the leaf being directly attached to the stem like that, there’s a little bit of a stem between the main stem of the plant and the leaf itself. So, the fancy term for that is usually petiole. And leaf stem is another fine way to say it. There are some plants where the leaves are attached directly to the stem, and there’s no petiole at all. Or even where the leaves are surrounding the stem, and it’s like it’s poking straight through them. But in this case at each node we have the leaves attached on either side, and there’s a little stem for each one, and then the leaf body is there. Yeah. When you’re up at the top of the plant and the newest growth, then you don’t see that quite as much. But that’s just because those leaves aren’t fully developed yet, and their petioles are not so obvious.

Katja (27:39):
Even here at the very tip-top of this one there is a petiole, but it’s just super, super short. Yeah. Now, so the petiole, the stem for the leaf, that is also opposite, so like a mirror image on either side of the stem. But then at the base of the petiole joining the stem, which sort of makes a V shape, at the base of that is the flowers. And the flowers are more like they’re not going in the same direction as the leaves. The leaves are a mirror image, like a straight line in one direction on either side of the stem.

Ryn (28:26):
You can call it north-south if you want. Just as a…

Katja (28:29):
And then the flowers are opposite that. They’re like in between, filling in the space in between the two leaves.

Ryn (28:37):
Yeah. The flowers on this plant, they grow from multiple nodes, right? So, we’ve got places where we’ve got the stem coming up, and we’ve got leaves. And we go up, and we’ve got more leaves. And you can have multiple flowers growing on the plant at or just under each of those nodes, right? So, some plants are going to have all their flowers right up at the tip or standing on their own stems entirely separate from the places that the leaves grow from. But in this case we have like the main stem of the plant, we’ve got the leaf nodes. And several but not every one of those leaf nodes has a flower growing just underneath of it or more than one flower.

Katja (29:21):
Yeah. More than one, most of these. Some of them you can tell that the flower is already passed. But the node for the flower, the little cup that was holding the flower is still there, and it’s just empty now. It’s not really going to stay empty because that’s where the seed is going to form. But you can’t, even if you get really… Well, if I get really close on this one, I can actually kind of see that. So, try that. Try getting really close on the little cup that was holding the flower right down at that node. And look in there and see if you can see the seeds forming. You might be able to, you might not. But in this case on this one, I can. They’re very small.

Ryn (30:08):
Yeah. Those little spots where the flowers were attached there, they almost looked like a flower themselves. Like if the main flowers weren’t there at all, you could be like okay, that’s sort of a flower-looking thing. Like it kind of opens, you know, it stretches out and then opens. And it’s a different color from the leaves and from the stem. It’s a little more of like a brownish sort of vaguely purple-maroon sort of thing going on.

Katja (30:34):
Like mauve maybe.

Ryn (30:35):
Yeah. And they have little stripes actually. They have little stripes going from the base up to the tips.

Flower Color, Shape, & Interior

Katja (30:42):
So, okay. So, but where the flowers are still attached, the ones that are still nice and pretty, they’re purple for starters. But they’re not solid purple. They’re purple, like a kind of medium bluish-purple with a much darker purple – or maybe we would even call that burgundy – decoration on them.

Ryn (31:13):
Speckling.

Katja (31:14):
Oh, that’s a good word. Speckling, yeah. And most of that… So okay, maybe we can talk about the shape of the flower, because that way I’ll be able to tell you where the speckling is. The shape of the flower is kind of funny. It comes up as one tube. And it starts off quite narrow, and then it opens. And it’s almost like if you had a tube, but you wanted it to bend over at the top. And so you would have to cut pieces of the tube so that you could let it bend over and open up at the top. And that’s how these flowers look. There’s really not individual petals like on a daisy you might be thinking of. It’s really like it’s one piece of fabric, or petal, or whatever that then at the top just has cuts in it so that it can open out.

Ryn (32:20):
Yeah. Open and divided.

Katja (32:22):
And they’re not all uniform, but they are symmetrical. So, we have that mirror imaging happening again. The one that goes towards the bottom is the largest one. And it’s almost like the plant is sticking out its tongue, like down. And then there’s two on the sides that are kind of medium-sized. And then there’s one at the top, but it looks like it was trying to be two.

Ryn (32:52):
It has a bit of a split in the middle.

Katja (32:53):
Yeah. It has a tiny bit of a split in the middle, and that one is the smallest.

Ryn (32:57):
Yeah. So, kind of that split one up top, and then little moderate-sized wings on the sides, and then this big lower lip all pointing out in the middle. Which also has a little bit of a divot or a division.

Katja (33:12):
Like you can see where the halfway point is, yeah. So, then that dark purple speckling is happening on the one that is sticking out its tongue or like the lower lip, and the one at the top, but not on the sides. The sides are just solid that lighter color purple.

Ryn (33:34):
Yeah.

Katja (33:36):
Now if you look in… These flowers are quite small, so you kind of have to get close. But if you look in, that speckling goes all the way down the tube, and there are tiny little hairs, really, really small little hairs with very tiny yellow, powdery dust, right? So, polleny dust. And it’s quite a pale yellow. And you almost wouldn’t notice it if you didn’t get really, really close. The hairs are mostly on the bottom part. Like where it’s sticking out its tongue, the tongue is hairy.

Ryn (34:37):
The inner part, yeah.

Katja (34:39):
And then all the way down into the tube the hairs keep going, but there’s not really hairs on the side or on the top. Although if you bend it back there is on the tippy-top some more yellow. And that is going to be like the polleny bits and the reproductive parts of the plant, but they’re very small. It’s not like in a hibiscus where you see. They’re very, very tiny.

Plant Shape, Habitat, Scent, & (Maybe) Taste

Ryn (35:16):
Okay. So, we can also notice that this is a plant that is not standing straight up and tall so much all by itself. Like some of them are standing tall but only like a few inches. After they get a few inches tall, then they sort of flop over. And it’s like at that point they would be more like leaning on other plants that are around them, or we also know this plant would even creep along the ground.

Katja (35:44):
Here’s one that is. So, here’s one where it just went straight to the ground. And so the leaves in this case are kind of standing up a little bit so that they’re off the ground. And it is still trying to flower, but mostly it is going along the ground. And that’s a runner where it’s going to make more plants at each of those points where the leaves are. So, this is one of the ways. Plants can reproduce in a few different ways. They can have seeds. And this is not really reproduction so much as it is expansion, right? So, there’s going to be more plants, but it’s because a plant has sent out a runner. And then along that runner there will be roots that form and more plants come up from it.

Ryn (36:37):
Yeah. Okay.

Katja (36:40):
And also, you know, you were saying about how it’s not one plant standing tall like one evening primrose, or one poppy, or something like that. There’s – I don’t know – 20 or 30 of them here.

Ryn (36:56):
They like to be together.

Katja (36:57):
Yeah.

Ryn (36:59):
Not a solitary plant all by itself, ideally.

Katja (37:04):
Okay. You know, and also as we’re sitting here talking, there’s a bee over there visiting each flower, like a big fat bumble who’s visiting each flower. And so that also gives us information. Even though it’s not part of the plant, it does tell us that this plant is bee pollinated and not air pollinated. Or other pollinators as well, but it’s not air pollinated.

Ryn (37:28):
Yeah. Always be looking at where the plant is, who’s near the plant. You can be thinking a little bit about the quality of the soil or how damp or dry it might be there. If you get a sense of how water moves through the area around here, then that can help you to understand a little bit more about the plant through its habitat and through its visitors.

Katja (37:50):
All right. Well, did you…?

Ryn (37:52):
Wait, wait, wait. Oh, okay. There’s one other feature, which we won’t be able to show you on the video. But it’s about if I take one of these leaves… And I’m not going to show it to you yet, right? But if I crush it up, and I give it a sniff, what comes through there? It’s not like the kind of pungency that we would get with thyme or sage.

Katja (38:19):
Yeah. It’s not a sharp smell.

Ryn (38:21):
Nope.

Katja (38:23):
Although on the second round there is more. It has a strong smell.

Ryn (38:30):
It’s green for sure.

Katja (38:32):
And kind of bright.

Ryn (38:34):
Kind of bright. Not citrusy, but okay.

Katja (38:41):
Yeah. But you do have… Once you crushed it more and more, there was a little like…

Ryn (38:48):
A little bit similar to celery or parsley leaf, a little bit in that direction.

Katja (38:52):
But there was a tiny little bit of something sharper just for a moment there.

Ryn (39:00):
If I bite it, and I chew it up, then I get a little bit of bitter. Not a strong bitter, but a little bit is there, right? But I don’t have the heat of a pungent herb. I don’t have sweetness. I don’t really have sour. So, just a little hint of bitter. That’s about what we’re coming through here, right? My point here is that your senses can give you helpful information. Now I don’t encourage you to go eating any random plant that you come across because that can get you into serious trouble.

Katja (39:41):
Right, right, right. Only eat it if you know. If you’ve done this, and you’re like okay, I know what plant this is. And now I’m going to get that extra information. Okay, then you can have a nibble. You can smell any plant. That’s always safe. But in terms of eating it, only do that if you know what plant it is. Well, so maybe now it’s time to tell them what plant it is.

Ryn (40:00):
Let’s do it.

The Big Reveal: Ground Ivy

Katja (40:01):
Were you able to guess? Let’s find out. Can you see it there? This is our plant. This is ground ivy. In some places this is called creeping Charlie, and here’s a good example of the creeping. See? Yep, that’s the one I was thinking of right there. And that’s how it’s doing that expansion. It’s going to create roots there, and these will be new plants, yeah. And this is right near the garden. Like see, right there is the garden bed. There’s some garlic in there. So, it does have really good soil. And it has more moisture than the surrounding area because I water when it’s too dry.

Ryn (40:58):
And because we don’t mow too often.

Katja (41:00):
Yeah, we do not mow too often.

Ryn (41:02):
And the growth of the plantain, and some dock, and some other things around here is helping to keep the water in and keep the soil moist.

Katja (41:09):
And we would be remiss if we did not include the Latin name here before we wrap up for ground ivy, which is Glechoma hederacea. It’s really important to know your Latin names, because that is how you will know for sure which plant you’re talking about.

Ryn (41:31):
If you don’t know ground ivy already this is one of our favorite herbs to work with for when there’s stuck fluid in your ear, nose, and throat area. It’s an excellent lymphatic mover, especially for this region of the body. But if you’ve got stuck lymph somewhere else, you can still work with it and get some benefits from it. Ground ivy is also a bit of a diuretic herb. Not super intense. It’s not on the level of your nettle leaf, and your dandelion leaf, and that kind of thing. But it does get the fluids moving and help to drain away the excess for you. So, it’s a really helpful herb, especially for people with more of a damp constitution or who are coping with some stuck fluids at the moment.

Katja (42:05):
I also really love ground ivy when I have a headache. Most of my headaches and migraines have a stagnation component where I feel like everything is too full in my head, and I feel a lot of pressure. And so the ground ivy here is a really good choice, because it’s helping to move those fluids and relieve the pressure. Yeah.

Ryn (42:30):
Yeah. Okay. So remember, the goal here wasn’t now you have learned ground ivy, although maybe you did, right? The goal was we give our attention to the plant. We use our skills of observation. Even if we don’t have all the fancy botanical terms. Even if we’re not able to apply all of those right now. Still developing the skill of looking, the skill of perceiving and identifying different elements that can help you distinguish this one from others. That’s what we’re really trying to cultivate here. That’s what makes you more effective at working through a plant guidebook and keying it out. And that’s also what makes you better capable to collaborate with the robots and to be more skillful in the way you work with the apps.

Katja (43:16):
Well, because they’re going to show you some pictures after they have identified what they think the plant is. And if you have really observed carefully, then when you look at those pictures, it’s going to be so much easier for you to say yes, that is my plant. Or no, that’s close, but it isn’t actually my plant. Yeah.

Ryn (43:37):
Cool. All right. Well, we hope you found that entertaining and maybe helpful. And so yeah, thanks for listening and tuning into the podcast this time. We’ll be back soon with some more Holistic Herbalism podcasts for you. Until then take care of yourselves. Take care of each other. Drink some tea.

Katja (43:54):
Drink some tea.

Ryn (43:55):
And look at some plants.

Katja (43:57):
Go look at a plant. Bye-bye.

Life it pretty overwhelming right now, and it’s affecting the way our brains function. When we can’t focus or can’t remember things, we typically blame it on things like perimenopause or ADHD – but the literal firehose of data that comes at us every day is an even bigger cause: it’s a LOT for our brains to process!
Tulsi can help!

Truly one of the most versatile and multifaceted herbs on the planet, tulsi is a must-know plant for any herbalist. Its capacity as a nervine is immediately palpable, as it helps us release tension and anxiety without causing any sedation. When taken over the long term, tulsi expresses itself as an adaptogen – helping us to move more easily out of a stress response, back to a comfortable and calm baseline. Tulsi is also very flexible, and can be formulated with lots of other nervines and mental health herbs to create a perfectly personalized formula.

Some of our favorite herbs to pair with tulsi include:

• Ground ivy – for moving the lymph in your head (ear/nose/throat) – and maybe even the glymph in your brain!
• Elderflower – for draining stuck fluids from the head, and for releasing tense heat
• Ginkgo – for increasing blood flow to the brain and protecting the health of nerves
• Rosemary – for cutting through the fog and sharpening the mind
• Peppermint – for a breath of cool air moving through your mind, and for releasing tension held in the belly

Still feeling stressed? Check out our new Stress Management course! Learn all about adaptogens, nervines, restoratives, and herbs to lift your spirits in this inexpensive, focused course. It covers everything you need to get through stressful times – and to help the ones you love, too!

Like all our offerings, this is a self-paced online video course, which comes with free access to twice-weekly live Q&A sessions, lifetime access to current & future course material, twice-weekly live Q&A sessions with us, open discussion threads integrated in each lesson, an active student community, study guides, quizzes & capstone assignments, and more!

PS: If you’re in the Boston area, check out Herbstalk on June 6th & 7th! Ryn will be teaching a class there on Affordable Analogues for Expensive Herbs, and the conference as a whole is very much worth visiting. It’s the last Herbstalk ever, so don’t miss it!

If you have a moment, it would help us a lot if you could subscribe, rate, & review our podcast wherever you listen. This helps others find us more easily. Thank you!!

Our theme music is “Wings” by Nicolai Heidlas.

Episode Transcript

Katja (00:00):
Hi, I’m Katja. And I’m here at Commonwealth Holistic Herbalism in Boston, Massachusetts. Today Ryn is working on his presentation for a local herb conference called Herbstalk. He’s going to be talking about affordable analogs for expensive herbs, and that’s part of our accessible herbalism work. We’re going to be talking about that in the podcast feed later this summer as well. So, if you’re not here locally, and you can’t go to that conference, don’t worry. We’re going to be talking about it here too. But today what I want to talk to you about is tulsi. You know, if you have listened to the podcast before, you know that we talk a lot about individual solutions. Like every body is different, and so you need to find the right herb for the problem that the person’s having. And it’s not going to be the same herb for every person. And all of that is true and important. But today I’m going to throw all that out the window, and I’m going to talk about tulsi for everyone. Okay, don’t worry. At the end I’m also going to talk about some other herbs that go along with tulsi, or even if you don’t like tulsi you can work with instead. But the reason that I’m going to talk about it for everyone is because right now we are all sharing some of the same problems. And I think a big sort of bold topic header at the top is that our brains are full to overflowing, and it is making it really hard for us to really do anything.

Katja (02:07):
Okay, so I’m very excited to talk about it. But before I do, I’m supposed to say the thing. And the thing is the reclaimer, that I’m not a doctor. I’m an herbalist and a holistic educator. The ideas discussed in this podcast do not constitute medical advice. No state or federal authority licenses herbalists in the United States. So, these discussions are for educational purposes only. We want to remind you that good health doesn’t mean the same thing for everyone. Good health doesn’t really exist as an objective standard. It’s influenced by your individual needs, your experiences, and your goals. So, keep in mind that we’re not attempting to present a single, dogmatic right way that everyone should adhere to, because everybody is different. So, the things that we’re talking about today may or may not apply directly to you. But we hope that they’ll give you some new information to think about and some ideas to experiment with further. Finding your way to better health is both your right and also your own personal responsibility. Which does not mean that you are to blame for your state of health right now. And it doesn’t mean that you’re alone on the journey of figuring out how to get to where you want to be. But it does mean that the final decision when you’re considering any course of action, whether it’s discussed on the internet or prescribed by a physician, is always your choice to make.

Information Overload Everywhere

Katja (03:34):
All right, tulsi for everyone. Are you ready? So, the thing that made me think about this, I was trying to write a newsletter this week, and my brain was just mush. And I looked at my inbox because, you know, you’re trying to do the thing you’re supposed to do, and you can’t think of how to do it. So, what do you do? You check your email, and then you check your this, and then you check your that. You check all the things, right? So, I’m checking my email. And I was like you know, there are 7,719 emails in this inbox. And I just thought about that number for a moment. It’s like that number didn’t happen overnight. It’s been like that for quite some time. But it’s kind of an overwhelming number. Like how is any person supposed to process 7,719 pieces of, not even pieces of information but like letters of information, you know? And except that then I was thinking about your inbox probably looks exactly the same. Like all of our inboxes have thousands and thousands of emails, and most of them we don’t read because it’s impossible. But even the number of ones that we do read, it’s kind of overwhelming, right? It’s just like an enormous amount of data that we’re supposed to process every day. And it’s not just email. It’s also whatever you do for work, and then it’s all the people who depend on you, and then it’s all the news coming at you from all the different directions.

Katja (05:21):
My point is just that I was suddenly overwhelmed with how much information processing we are expected to do on a daily basis. And I don’t think that our brains were meant to handle this much data every day. You know, kind of like when you’re working on a computer, and you’re doing something that’s too big for the computer, and then the computer’s really slow. And you’re clicking on the thing, and nothing’s happening because the computer’s really slow. Because the thing that it’s trying to do, whatever the calculation or the whatever is using up all of the processing power. Okay, that but in our brains, right? And then I was thinking about that, and I was thinking about how every time that I log onto social media, and I’m sure this is the same for you too especially. Especially because I am a woman of a certain age. And so my social media wants to, like I look at Instagram, and it wants to tell me that I should wear makeup specially made for older women and whatever else about my wrinkles, and my hair, and everything so that I can still say beautiful as if I’m still young. And I don’t need all that, thank you. I don’t need to be reminded that I’m whatever age I am now, 50 whatever. Just stop. I don’t want the makeup. I don’t want it. But the other thing that I see all the time is oh, is your brain overwhelmed? It’s because of the perimenopause. Or oh, is it hard for you to focus? You have ADHD and all these things. And like okay, perimenopause is real. It has effects, and those effects are real, fine. ADHD is real also, like yes. But I just look at all that stuff, and I think you know, maybe, but maybe it’s also that I’m supposed to process like a cajillion billion things every hour of all this information coming into my brain. And so maybe when I get up, and go into the kitchen, and get to the kitchen and say hold on. Why am I here? Why did I walk in here? I wanted something, what was it? And then I say oh, well, my brain doesn’t work. It’s perimenopause. Because right, that’s what we all do. Or if you’re not of a certain age yet, then you say oh, well my brain doesn’t work. It’s ADHD or whatever, right?

Katja (08:15):
Well, I am in perimenopause, but I don’t think that’s why I couldn’t remember why I went into the kitchen. I think the reason I couldn’t remember why I went into the kitchen is because there were 16 other things in my brain in that moment, and I just couldn’t hold on to that 17th thing. And yes, okay, then you stand there, and you say, hmm. Why was I here? And maybe it comes back to you, and maybe it doesn’t. And then you go back to, in my case, my desk. And then I say oh, well, that was dumb. And then five minutes later I’m like oh, that’s what I needed. And then I… Right? Okay. I think that so much of the overwhelm and so much of people saying things like oh, I can’t this or that because my brain just doesn’t work right. There are lots of factors for that, but I really think that one of them is just there is so much to process every day. And this is why I’m going to say tulsi for everyone. Because yes, we do need personalized solutions. Yes, the same solution is not going to work for every person. But in this one regard, we are all people dealing with the same problem. There are other things. All of us have our own unique, weird brains that work their own unique, weird ways and do not come with user’s manuals. And so whether you have ADHD, or whether you are neurodiverse, or whether you are perimenopausal, or whatever else, we all have to figure out just how to use our brains. True.

Your Brain On Overload

Katja (10:06):
But we’re all dealing with information overload. And tulsi can help with that because there is actually a processing center in your brain. It’s called the hippocampus. And that is where we process the things that we experience every day. So, all of your everything that happens in a day, you can imagine the hippocampus as the computer that is responsible. You can imagine that your brain is not one computer. It’s many computers, right? It’s like a whole room full of computers. And one of the computers is responsible for moving your right hand. And another computer is responsible for your ability to speak, and process language, and whatever. And okay, this is an analogy but okay. And so the hippocampus is the computer that’s responsible for taking all of the things that happened in your day and deciding which of them is going to get stored in long-term storage, and which of them can be thrown out, and which of them you might need five minutes from now but not five years from now, and all that kind of stuff. It’s about literally the data processing of your brain. And this is also, like there’s a real tie in to PTSD here. Which is that this part of your brain can get damaged, especially if you’re under stress for a long period of time. And then if you have a traumatic event, anybody who has a traumatic event, this part of your brain is going to be involved in the processing of that trauma. But if this part of your brain is like gummed up and not working as well as it can, then that contributes to the likelihood of PTSD. Because part of that syndrome is that you’re not able to process the trauma. Like you’re stuck in the present of the trauma because you can’t process it into some kind of long-term storage.

Katja (12:14):
All right, well that was a little tangent there, but that’s fine. So, the reason that I’m talking about this part of your brain is because tulsi actually improves the function of that part of your brain. And the funny thing is that stress decreases the function of that part of your brain. So okay, well, we’re all pretty stressed right now. Like I don’t think I know anybody who is not pretty stressed right now. And so all of us probably have degraded hippocampus function, right? And on top of it all of us are being expected to process so much information. Because the thing is that your brain can’t really tell the difference between something that happened to you directly today. Like the car that like slammed on its brakes in front of you, and then you also had to slam on your brakes. That happened to you. Versus something you see on social media, or on the news, or whatever that did not happen to you, but you are watching it. Obviously we know logically oh, that didn’t happen to me. That happened to somebody else, and I’m watching the video versus this thing happened to me. But parts of your brain, especially the part of your brain that is involved in stress response and threat response, can’t really tell the difference between something that you observed happening to somebody else, and you just looked at it on your phone while you were sitting on your couch, and something that actually happened to you. So, this part of your brain has to do a lot of processing to figure out what all this stuff is and where it goes. Like, how do I deal with it? Do I stash it? Do I throw it away? Do I what? Okay, so the problem is we have this part of the brain. It processes stuff. We have too much stuff to process. This part of the brain slows down when we’re under a bunch of stress. We’re all under a bunch of stress. And that’s where we get to the solution of tulsi for everyone, because tulsi makes this part of the brain function better.

Tulsi for Everyone* & Take a Lot

Katja (14:32):
Okay? So, that’s our like starting point. I have not actually… Now it’s time to investigate this, right? Like we’ve set everything up here, now it’s time to investigate it. So, the first thing that I want to say is when I say tulsi for everyone, it does have a little asterisk next to it. Because tulsi is a super safe herb that is unlikely to have allergic reactions and is safe with lots of different kinds of medications. So, if you’re taking medications, usually you don’t have to be concerned about a drug interaction with tulsi. But there is one thing that is worth mentioning, and that is that tulsi also improves the way that you process glucose. Now for most people that’s great because most of us eat too much sugar. And having an herb that like oh, and on the side I’m also going to help you deal with all that sugar is like wow, two for one, right? But if you’re a medicated diabetic, and you take insulin, it doesn’t mean that you can’t work with tulsi. It just means that you should make sure that you are testing your blood sugar levels regularly. And if you’re not taking insulin, but you’re taking something like metformin for a Type II diabetes medication, then also make sure that you’re testing your blood glucose levels regularly. Because the thing is that if you start taking tulsi, your body might get better at processing glucose. And so if you are taking metformin, et cetera, your dose might not need to be as high. And you would see that in a glucose test. You would notice like oh hey, my numbers are consistently lower now. And if you’re going to keep working with tulsi, then you can talk to your doctor about that. If you are taking insulin, there is no herb that will stop your need for insulin. If you have to take insulin, you have to take insulin. But it might reduce the amount of insulin that you have to take. You know, similar to if you have a day or two where you eat no sugar and very low carb, that’s also going to change the number of units of insulin that you need, right? So, you still need insulin those days just not as much. So okay, so this is not like an unsafe kind of thing. It’s not like an interaction per se. It just means that especially when you’re calculating how much insulin you need, it’s really important that you test so that you get it right. Because those values might change if you’re working consistently with tulsi.

Katja (17:24):
All right. So, that’s the caveat there. But that said, I really do recommend it. And I’m going to say right from the beginning, take a lot. Not a little bit, take a lot. So, the definition of a lot here is going to be at least a quart of tea daily. And if it’s tincture, boy, I would say three or four droppersful every hour. And you might be like wow, that’s a lot of tulsi. It is. But when we’re thinking about just being super overwhelmed with everything that’s coming in, well, a lot is coming in, and so we need a lot of processing power boost, right? Another way that you can do it… And it’s funny because I think maybe this even kind of kicked off the thinking in my mind. Over the last three months or so I’ve been experimenting with encapsulated tulsi. I’ve been taking, and they don’t give me anything for saying this, but it just is what I took. New Chapter has a liquid concentrated extract. It’s like liquid in a capsule, right? And Gaia used to make one. I don’t know if they still do. But the one that I’ve been taking is the New Chapter one. And this kind of liquid capsule, it’s a concentrated liquid extract so that you’re able to get a higher dose in the capsule than if you just had ground-up, powdered tulsi in there. And I have been taking three or four of them a day. And wow, the reason that I started it was because in general I’m not a huge fan of capsules. There are a few things that are really handy in a capsule. And it’s not like capsules are bad, or evil, or anything like that. Just usually I’m a tea person. And I want to encourage people to work with tea because also it means that you’re taking a minute and making a cup of something warm for yourself. There’s a whole ritual aspect to it, and the I’m going to take a break for a minute while I get up and get my tea sort of thing. There’s other aspects than just the herb itself that help with the various parts of self-care. So, I’m a big fan of tea.

Katja (20:10):
But I was like you know, I really want to see how these new capsules, like these better extracts that we have today, how do they compare to tea? Do they have as strong of an effect? Is this a viable option for my clients? Because the reality is that when you work with clients, a lot of times they’re too busy to make tea, right? So, as clinical herbalists we need to experiment with things and see is this really a good substitute? So okay, so the last three months or so I’ve been taking these capsules for this reason, to see if it would be a good substitute. And I have really been surprised at the buoyancy of my mood, if that makes sense. Even though things are stressful in the world and bananas really, that I have stayed much more positive than I would have expected for myself. That I have also really noticed a shift in focus and a shift in yes, being able to process things, which was expected. But the thing that I think was a little less expected was also being fault tolerant, like better able to handle it when I’m not processing things well. So, instead of getting upset because oh, I can’t focus today. And now I’m kind of like spiraling and feeling bad about whatever. Like I’m bad. I’m not doing the thing. To like what I’ve noticed is that it is so much easier, and I don’t even really have to think that much about it. It’s so much easier to just say hey, I’m spiraling. You know what I should do? I should get up, and I should walk around for like 10 minutes. And then I can come back to this and try again, and it’s going to be all right. And maybe it’s all right, or maybe I have to walk around for 10 minutes again, you know? But those kinds of shifts, that kind of oh, this isn’t working. I’m going to stop trying to make it work. I’m going to take an action, and then I’m going to come back to this. That kind of strategy has been coming effortlessly. So, both I have been more able to focus but also more able to deal with it when I couldn’t focus well.

Katja (23:04):
That surprised me because I really did not expect the capsules to be as effective as tea. But in fact, okay, I’ve been taking three or four of them a day. And so I suppose I could calculate, in fact, I definitely can calculate. They give you some math there about the equivalency of their extract. So, I’m sure that I could calculate exactly like what kind of comparison that is to tea, but I haven’t done that yet. Well okay, now I probably should go and do that after I record this. But the point is that man, I was really in my tea is best place, and this has really been working. Now, I’ve been talking about tulsi a lot lately to students, and clients, and whatever. And lots of people have been working with tea or with tincture and also finding really good results. So, my conclusion here is not everybody should be taking tulsi capsules. But instead hey, if you feel like you are overwhelmed and having trouble processing everything that’s coming at you, maybe try high doses of tulsi. Whether you take it in capsules because that’s easiest or whatever, or whether you take it in tea, or in tincture, or some other way. Maybe you make an electuary. Maybe you make like a syrup or whatever. It’s all cool. But take a lot, take a lot. Just if you’re a medicated diabetic, make sure that you’re checking your blood glucose levels.

Stagnant Lymph & Brain Fog

Katja (24:49):
Okay, but you know, you know that we love to personalize. So, of course I have to add a couple other things in here, right? And today the thing I want to add in is herbs that help move things. I guess tulsi is one of these as well. Herbs that help move things in your head. And so tulsi is absolutely moving things in the brain. And then this other category that I want to look at is herbs that stimulate glymphatic action. And so glymph is the lymph of your brain, right? So, your whole body has a lymphatic system, that’s the fluid in your body that is not blood. So the fluid that is carrying the trash, the fluid that is carrying whatever was in the interstitial stuff, and it needs to get to the kidneys so that you can pee it out or get to the wherever it’s going, to the liver. It’s not only trash. Also the immune system uses the lymphatic channels as a transportation mechanism as well. But if you categorize it largely as the trash system, you wouldn’t really be wrong. So, you have all kinds of lymph in your head. And you’re probably most familiar, the lymph nodes that you’re probably most… So, we have lymphatic vessels, and then we have lymphatic nodes, which is kind of like a place where a lot of vessels come together for a gathering station. And then it’s going to continue on from there.

Katja (26:32):
Okay, so the lymph nodes that you’re probably most familiar with are the ones that are right under your jaw, kind of towards the back of your jaw. That when you were a kid if you were getting sick, then your parent or your guardian would feel your lymph nodes there. And if they were swollen, then they were like oh okay, yeah, you’re sick. You should stay home. Or oh, your lymph nodes are swollen. We better take your temperature or whatever. So, those are probably the ones that you’re most familiar with, but you have them all over your body and in lots of places in your head. And so if you think about a lot of times when you get various kinds of headaches and migraines, especially if they are ones that have a lot of pressure. Then a lot of times that is stagnant fluid that is stuck in your head, and that’s lymph. And so if you think about throughout your head you have these drainage tubes that are just heading down. They go along behind your ears. They go down your neck. They collect along with the ones at the bottom of your jaw. They go down to some lymph nodes at your collarbone and down through your body. Ultimately they’re going to get your kidneys, right? And all of that fluid has to keep moving. If it doesn’t keep moving, then we have two problems.

Katja (28:08):
One is all the trash is just sitting there rotting, wherever it is, right? So, imagine that all of the trash in your head, normal trash just like in your house. You’re not doing anything toxic. It’s just normal trash because in a day you open a package, or you whatever. Okay, so this is also just the normal trash that every cell produces as it’s going through its day. But if it’s not being carried away, then it’s just piling up, and creating pressure, and creating inflammation. Okay, so that’s one problem. But then the other problem is now that you have all this trash piling up in your head, you can’t get any fresh materials up into your brain. So, you literally aren’t getting enough oxygen, and you aren’t getting enough nourishment into those areas. So, that also causes… If you don’t have enough oxygen in your leg, because you’re like sitting on your leg, and so you’ve reduced the blood flow. What happens? Your leg falls asleep. And then it’s like really, really asleep. And then you try to walk on it, and then you feel unstable, right? Okay. But we can get that same thing going in the head just by creating a traffic jam because we didn’t clear the trash out, and so nothing new can get in there. And if you think about it that way, doesn’t it suddenly make a lot of sense? Okay, now listen. This is not the only way to get brain fog. There’s a lot of different aspects of brain fog, and also brain fog is not like one thing. We use that phrase to describe something that we’re feeling, but then there’s a lot of different mechanisms that can lead to that kind of feeling, right? Okay, so I want to be clear that I am not saying that this is the cause of all brain fog. However, this is a cause of a lot of brain fog. And if you are like man, I just can’t think. I feel like my brain is out of breath. Okay, well, is there a lot of stuff coming into it? That’s going to create more trash. Because all your cells are trying to work faster in your brain to process everything. And if they’re not getting the trash taken away, then they’re not getting anything fresh. And so literally kind of like your head’s falling asleep, but you’re still awake trying to process data.

Herbal Add-Ons

Katja (30:48):
All right? Did all that make sense? Because now we’ve got herbs that can help you with that. And some of my favorites are one is ground ivy. And this is the perfect time of year for ground ivy. Well, at least it is in New England. Right now all of the ground ivy here is flowering and beautiful. Ground ivy, in a lot of parts of the country it’s called creeping Charlie. And in Europe it’s called gil-over-the-ground or alehoof sometimes. Okay, so yeah, one of my really favorite herbs when you feel like everything is stuck in your head, and nothing is flowing the way that it should. Whether that is emotional, mental, or physical in terms of feeling that you have that stuck kind of headache. And elderflower is another one that I really love for this. It’s not elderflower time here yet, but south of us it probably is. It certainly is. So, depending on where you live, you can go get elderflowers now or soon. And it’s specifically the flowers here, not the berries. The flowers have this dispersive effect. And again, they’re helping to get that fluid moving. These two together are so helpful for me, for my type of migraines, for the type of migraine that I most commonly get, because it’s exactly that. It’s that stagnation pattern that so often comes when I’ve been at the computer for too long trying to deal with too much information. Everything is getting really stagnant. I’m not moving around. And then the pressure is building, and building, and building, in my head. Yeah, then it’s migraine time, not very fun. So okay, so tulsi is moving stuff inside the brain itself. Ground ivy and well, tulsi is moving a lot of other things too, but we’re focusing on that area, the hippocampus in the brain. Ground ivy and elderflower are two that I want to focus on for the lymphatic/glymphatic. The glymph is the part that’s in the actual brain, like inside the brain itself. And lymph is the stuff that’s outside of it, all throughout your ears, and your lymph nodes in your neck, and stuff like that. So, in your head you have a meeting of both of those.

Katja (33:39):
And then we can also point to some other kinds of movement. And we can highlight circulatory movements, so bringing fresh blood, which means fresh oxygen and nutrients to the brain. And so these are going to be ones that might be really familiar to you, like ginkgo. Okay? Tulsi also helps in this category all by itself. But you’re probably familiar with ginkgo. You are probably familiar with peppermint’s actions in this regard. Spearmint also can do this. And so, even mugwort is one that I really like, damiana here as well, even ginger. All of the herbs that are getting circulation moving are really going to be helpful here. But we can kind of put ginkgo at the top of the list because it is a very upward kind of circulatory. Oh, rosemary can go on this list as well, also a very up kind of movement. So, what does all this mean? You don’t have to work with every single one of those herbs that I just said. In fact, we started this saying tulsi for everyone. You can just go with tulsi and stop there if you want to. Because after all, if you’re overwhelmed, and you have too much to process, then you probably don’t want to sit and think about all this other stuff, right? You don’t actually have to. Just get tulsi, take a lot of it. But if you happen to have some ground ivy. If you happen to have some elderflower. If you have some ginkgo, or rosemary, or some mint that you enjoy, some mugwort even, go for it. You don’t have to take them all at the same time. You can take them throughout the day. And I have been taking the tulsi as capsules. I also have an elixir right now of blue vervain, tulsi, sage, and there’s a little rose in there too that I’ve been taking sort of situationally, especially when I feel like I’m getting very tense about things that I can’t control. And really, the blue vervain is the biggest part of that formula. But it does have tulsi in it, so I figure it’s worth mentioning.

Katja (36:07):
So, I take that when I’m feeling a certain kind of stress that is a very typical kind of stress for me to have. And then I really enjoy mugwort in tea. Mugwort and I’ll often put ginkgo in it, and then some juniper, and maybe some self-heal, and maybe some pine and orange peel, maybe a little hawthorn. So, we’ve got a lot of actions going on there. But in particular, we have a flavor that turns out kind of in the same direction as the flavor of gin. You know what I mean? There’s no alcohol in it but the sort of botanical flavor and then especially with the juniper in there. You don’t need very much juniper to get that flavor. And then the movement of fluids and the sort of stabilizing action of mugwort. Mugwort could have its own whole podcast actually just on this regard. Maybe that should be the next one: mugwort for everyone. But mugwort especially really helps to balance out that sort of emotional irrational response when you’re starting to panic about things with your measured rational response that says now, hold on. Hold on, let’s break this down and think about it rationally. And so if your emotions tend to run away with you when you’re feeling overwhelmed. And you need somebody to be like hold on, hold on. We can think about this. We can come up with an answer. Mugwort is real good at that.

More in the Stress Management Course

Katja (37:52):
Okay, so wow, I actually just listed a kabillion herbs, but hopefully it gets you thinking a little bit about how you could say tulsi for everyone. And then also say plus some friends to go along with it that are going to be exactly what I need to help balance everything out, right? Okay, now I talked about tulsi and the hippocampus, and if you want more information about that, about the ways, the science behind how tulsi is stimulating that action in the brain, then you can find that. You can go to Google Scholar and search for it, or you can grab our all-new Stress Management course. It’s one of our accessible courses, like our low-cost courses. It’s $25 for a whole – I don’t know – I think it’s 15 hours of video. It’s lots of really good stuff all specifically around how to deal with stress and overwhelm. And it has a whole chapter of I’m too overwhelmed to think about anything. Just give me an answer right now. And so it just asks you a question: do you feel like this? Here’s your answer. Do you feel like that? Here’s your answer. Because sometimes we feel like that. And it’s like no, I’m not going to study right now. I’m not going to learn something right now. I just need something that will help me. So, don’t worry, it’s got that right up at the top of the course. But it has so much information about how to manage stress, how stress happens in different ways, how overwhelm happens in your brain, and all the different strategies that you can take to wind that back. And it also explains how tulsi does this thing that it does in the hippocampus.

Katja (39:48):
Also some of that information around ashwagandha. Ashwagandha is another one that can have similar types of action around processing emotions, experiences, thoughts, et cetera, data. Yes, okay. So, it’s got all that for you. It’s got so much more. And you can find it at online.commonwealthherbs.com. And it’s the Stress Management course. All right. Whew. That was a little bit of a whirlwind. I kind of feel like I was talking fast, which might not really be abnormal at all. But I guess that’s appropriate for a discussion about information processing, and overwhelm, and overload. I hope that you can find a quiet moment in this day that feels good for you, just something that is nice and comforting. And this is the part of the podcast where Ryn would say take care of yourselves. Take care of each other. Drink some tea. And take a bunch of tulsi. Yay. So, I will see you again soon. I with Ryn will see you again soon. We have been splitting up for the podcast because we realize that we are not making enough podcast episodes for you. But we have a new campaign starting next week where we really are going to try to make one every week. No promises, but we’re going to try for you. And hopefully we will be together for some of them for you too. At any rate, I will see you soon with lots more fun, herby goodness. And until then, bye-bye.

We’ve come to the end of the “mainstream” top-40 best-selling herbs list! Dandelion, rhubarb, and ginseng take the last three spots.

Dandelion is an herbal workhorse. It’s inexpensive because it’s ubiquitous, and its resilience is legendary – dandelion coming up through the concrete is one of the herbalist’s favorite symbols of resistance and the power of nature. Much more than a simple “detox” herb, dandelion root and leaf improve the functions of our liver and kidneys, feed both us and our gut flora, and eliminate excess fluids from the system. Its bright yellow flowers can even lift our spirits when taken in tincture or wine – this is one of Ryn’s indispensable herbal remedies for the winter doldrums.

Rhubarb root used to be much more of an herbal mainstay than it is in contemporary herbalism. The Eclectics of the 19th century worked with it extensively, largely for its “cathartic” – stimulant laxative – properties. It is a key ingredient in the famous “neutralizing cordial”, a formula developed in that era and designed to be a nearly-universal remedy for digestive upsets of all sorts. This remedy is still prepared by herbalists today, though often with some variations in the ingredient list.

Ginseng needs no introduction. It is one of the most famous medicinal herbs in the world, and it is “the original adaptogen” – the category which has spawned millions of dollars in product sales in our stressed-out, depleted, fatigued society. Ginseng products can be extremely helpful, but you absolutely cannot simply buy the first one you find: these remedies are very prone to adulteration. That, too, is an old problem: historical texts are littered with descriptions of adulteration and falsification of supposedly mature, supposedly Panax roots which were nothing of the kind. Some things never change…

38. Dandelion – Taraxacum officinale

• our Dandelion mini-monograph
• HHP 220: Herbs A-Z: Taraxacum & Thuja
• Dandelion desktop wallpaper & phone background

39. Rhubarb – Rheum spp.

• Rhubarb in the US Dispensatory (1918)
• Rhubarb at Herbal Reality
• The second half of HHP 29 has a discussion of “classic cancer cure-all” formulae which include “detoxifying” laxative plants like rhubarb.
• Syrupus Rhei et Potassae Compositus.—Compound Syrup of Rhubarb and Potassa in King’s American Dispensatory (1898) – this is the “neutralizing cordial”.

40. Ginseng – Panax spp.

• Ginseng at Herbal Reality
• Panax: The ginseng abuse syndrome, Paul Bergner
• What in the Name of Panax Are Those Other “Ginsengs”, Dennis V.C. Awang

“Detox” came up in this episode (again), and we hinted at the issues rampant in this category of supplement products. For the full story, you’ll want to dig in to our course Elements of Detoxification. This course takes a fresh look at the concepts of “toxicity” and “detoxification”, a holistic perspective that goes beyond “cleanses” and products. Learn a memorable, practical model for understanding how the body’s detox functions work, along with the roles herbs can play in supporting them.

Like all our offerings, this is a self-paced online video course, which comes with free access to twice-weekly live Q&A sessions, lifetime access to current & future course material, twice-weekly live Q&A sessions with us, open discussion threads integrated in each lesson, an active student community, study guides, quizzes & capstone assignments, and more!

Previous episode in this series:

• 1: Psyllium, Elderberry, Turmeric, Ashwagandha
• 2: Apple Cider Vinegar, Cranberry
• 3: Wheatgrass, Beet Root, Ginger
• 4: Green Tea, Fenugreek, Ivy Leaf
• 5: Ginkgo, Guarana, Maca
• 6: Saw Palmetto, Cinnamon, Echinacea
• 7: Tribulus, Pycnogenol, Garlic
• 8: Milk Thistle, Black Cohosh
• 9: Aloe, Flax (plus new market data!)
• 10: Valerian, Pumpkin, Goji, Red Yeast Rice
• 11: Yohimbe & Horny Goat Weed
• 12: CBD, Fennel, Oats
• 13: Bacopa, Senna, Rhodiola

If you have a moment, it would help us a lot if you could subscribe, rate, & review our podcast wherever you listen. This helps others find us more easily. Thank you!!

Our theme music is “Wings” by Nicolai Heidlas.

Episode Transcript

Ryn (00:00:00):
Hi, I’m Ryn. And I’m here at Commonwealth Holistic Herbalism in Boston, Massachusetts and on the internet everywhere, thanks to the power of the podcast. All right. Well, today we come to part 14 of this series that I’ve been doing on the herbalists’ views on the top-selling herbs. Remember that we’ve been looking at a list of the 40 bestselling herbs in commerce, and that’s what’s called the mainstream list. There is a natural channel list, which we’ll come back to at the end of this episode today. But for now, we have actually reached the end of the top 40 mainstream, bestselling herbal supplements list in the United States. Whew. Okay. So, those three that we’re going to finish off with are dandelion, rhubarb and ginseng. Mmm, ginseng, yes. All right. So, I have a lot to say about each of these. They’re interesting herbs, fascinating plants with a lot going for them. And as usual for this series, the goal here is to describe both their current market presentation. What are you going to find if you go searching for these herbs on Amazon or vitacost.com. Or just if you go to the shelves of a grocery store or a pharmacy, and you look at herbal supplements. What are the ones you’re most likely to find, and what are the bottles going to say? What kind of marketing language and advertising language is going to be used for these herbs and remedies made from them by the people who sell them? And then how can we compare that to what does the traditional herbalist think about these plants? What have people known and understood about them historically? What have people done with them in the ancient world or in historical times? And what do we do with them today in clinical herbalism as we practice with these herbs? And how does that differ and how does that overlap with those market presentations? Yeah.

Ryn (00:02:06):
So, that’s the topic. Those are the three herbs. And before we jump in, I just want to remind everybody that we are not herbalists. Nope, we are herbalists. Hang on. How does this go? Ah, yes. We are not doctors. There you go. We are not doctors. We are herbalists and holistic health educators. The ideas discussed in this podcast do not constitute medical advice. No state or federal authority licenses herbalists in the United States. So, these discussions are for educational purposes only. We want to remind you that good health doesn’t mean the same thing for everyone. Good health doesn’t exist as one objective standard. It’s influenced by the individual needs, experiences, and goals of each person. So, keep in mind we’re not attempting to present one single dogmatic right way that you must adhere to if you want to work with herbs or be an herbalist. Everyone’s body is different. So, the things that we’re talking about may or may not apply directly to you. But we hope that they’ll give you some new information to think about and some ideas to research and to experiment with further. Finding a way to better health is both your right and your own personal responsibility. Now, this doesn’t mean that you’re alone on the journey, and it doesn’t mean that you’re to blame for your current state of health. But it does mean that the final decision when you’re considering any course of action, whether that was discussed on the internet or prescribed by a physician, that’s always your choice to make. And we want to make it an informed choice. Okay.

#38 Dandelion: A Common Detox/Cleanse & Diuretic Herb

Ryn (00:03:29):
So, here we go. We’re talking about dandelion first today. That is Taraxacum officinale in the botanical Latin name. All right. All right. So, when we go and look at dandelion supplements, what we’re going to find is that most of them are focusing their claims, their advertising, their statements on cleansing and detoxification. So, if you’ve listened to the podcast for any amount of time, you’ve probably heard some of our comments on cleanses and detoxes and the way in which these concepts are most often misapplied or abused in the service of selling products. At the same time I think we’ve also mentioned repeatedly that these are very popular categories of product when it comes to herbal supplements. They account for a large share of the sales in a given pharmacy or a given supplement store. People are looking for this. People want to do a cleanse. They want to detoxify themselves. And I mean, who wouldn’t, right? It sounds great to get some crud out of your body, to get some toxins out of you, to feel clean and pure, right? Everybody, I think, wants that, or a lot of people do anyway. And the issue we run into with this is less the intention behind that, which I do agree with. I work to keep poisons, and toxins, and pesticides, and microplastics out of my life as much as I can, right?

Ryn (00:05:02):
But what I run into the problem with this idea of detox and cleansing is that oftentimes the way it’s executed is we’re going to go in, and we’re going to stimulate your bowels. We’ll talk about rhubarb and that concept in just a short time here, right? Or it’s I’m going to go in, and I’m going to amp up liver function. And I’m going to squeeze the bile out of it, and get that stuff flowing, and get the crud out of you real good. And in some cases these approaches could be helpful short term. In other cases what you end up doing is you just give somebody a bunch of diarrhea for a while, and you empty out their bowels real good. And then maybe you follow that up in your little detox kit with some fiber supplements. And they have a nice big heavy bowel movement, and they’re like ah, now I’m empty. But that’s not the whole story, right? Because toxins are something that we do get exposed to in the world. Our bodies do have systems for coping with them. And in general that’s something you want to be humming along at a good, steady pace all the time. And to have its moments when there’s higher activity, like when you’re asleep, is a particularly important one, right? But you want it to be an ongoing process rather than something that’s kind of like not functioning at all until you give it a big heavy stimulus, and you make it happen, right? And a lot of times the concepts, the way that detox products and kits are presented, is very much in that latter mode of like you have to force your body to detox. It’s got to be a strong, heavy, intense intervention. You’re going to cleanse yourself. We’re going to flush you out, right, that kind of thing.

Ryn (00:06:35):
Whereas the approach that I would take to detox is more steady, more measured, and it plays out over longer spans of time. And dandelion is an herb that I would say it’s fair to comment that this herb can enhance your body’s natural capacity for coping with and eliminating substances that don’t belong in the body. Whether they came in from outside of you in food, in pollutants, in stuff you inhale, whatever. Or if they were things generated within your own body. Because we make plenty of trash as part of our metabolism, and we have to get rid of that too. And for a lot of people the major toxin load that they’re coping with is actually endogenously-produced substances that you’re having trouble disposing of. Okay. So, you can hear more about that whole concept of toxicity, and detoxification, and cleansing, and how to do that in a more appropriate, sustainable, and I would say effective manner in a course that we teach called Elements of Detoxification. I’ll put a link in the show notes. I may have some more comments about that at the end of this episode. But I just wanted to lead and say there’s a lot that can be said about that. A lot of clarity that we can provide about what are toxins, where do they come from, what are the major ones we’re actually dealing with? And how can we deal with them more effectively with the help of holistic interventions and of course, with herbs?

Ryn (00:08:00):
And there is a place for dandelion in that work as well, right? Dandelion is an interesting herb because it’s not super intense. It’s not like a heavy hitter in terms of liver stimulation, or in terms of kidney stimulation, or certainly in terms of having some kind of a laxative quality. Dandelion is a fairly gentle plant, and this is one of the reasons why it’s one of my favorites. It’s one of, I would say, most herbalist operating in the US today at least in the circles that I run in or that I contact in the course of my life, dandelion is a pretty much perennial favorite. And part of that is because it’s inexpensive. It’s widely available. You’ve got people who are there trying to kill the dandelions in their lawn. And then you’ve got folks like us that are trying to harvest the dandelions from the yard and be like, well, you’re pretty much organically grown. You have some good quality material. I’m going to work with this. Okay. So, a wide array of approaches to dandelion out there in the world. But let’s just say when it comes to products in the market, on the websites, whatever, again, focused on cleansing, focused on detox in terms of their advertising. I found some, or you’ll find some when you go looking that highlight support for quote, water balance or for fluid levels. Like that would be the little label claim on the front. And that I read as a way to just refer to the diuretic effects of dandelion. Some brands will simply just say this is an herbal diuretic. Eh, pretty straightforward. I kind of like that. I appreciate that when people are clear and specific about what they’re trying to express to others. Remember that there are barriers to that kind of clarity in the market because of the laws that exist around what kind of label claims you can make, and the regulations, and all of that kind of thing. But anyway, sometimes herbal diuretic, pretty straightforward, okay?

Dandelion Product Types

Ryn (00:09:52):
Products made from dandelion, the majority of them are made with the root. We can actually work with all different parts of the plant: the root, the leaf, the stem, the flower. And I’ll describe some of those applications in just a moment. But when we look at herbal products in the marketplace, we mainly see root-based remedies more so than the leaf, which would be like second. And you don’t really see the others so much. I have recently found one herbal supplier who will sell you dried dandelion flowers. And I tried them out, pretty nice. I definitely prefer gathering my own and having them fresh. But anyway, that’s rare, unusual, and not very common at all, right? So root, leaf, okay. When you do see leaf products, there tends to be a little differentiation from the root. They’re more often going to express a focus on quote, circulatory health. But again, that is something that doesn’t explain to people what is actually going on. The way, the way in which dandelion can support circulatory health would be by eliminating excess fluid from your system. And when we carry too much fluid in our bodies, that drives apart blood pressure. There’s literally just more fluid in your pipes, in your tubes, right, pressing against the walls of the hoses that run through your body, right? So, if there’s too much fluid, and we can drain some out with an herbal diuretic like dandelion leaf, we can reduce that pressure. And that can ease the job of the circulatory system. And it can ease the pressure on the blood vessels, their propensity to stretch or burst even, leading into things like varicosities, or spider veins, or stuff like that, or hemorrhoids for that matter. Easing some of the pressure on the heart and the work that it has to do, right?

Ryn (00:11:48):
So, that can all be very helpful, but let’s be clear, that only makes sense, you only give an herbal diuretic to drain excess fluids, when there are excess fluids to drain, right? If we have somebody with a very dry constitution. And you can see all of the veins under their skin. And they have dry expressions on the skin, or on the scalp, or other places in the body. They don’t need an herbal diuretic to improve their circulation. They don’t need an herbal diuretic to improve their blood pressure. Somebody with that pattern could have high blood pressure. But they would get better relief from that with relaxants and maybe something like linden in particular to improve hydration, improve fluid movement, and to release the tension. That’s probably the major cause for someone with a dry constitution to have elevated blood pressure. So, this is one of those many cases that we’ve highlighted through the course of this series and elsewhere where supports fluid balance or improved circulatory health doesn’t really tell you with clarity what the herb is actually doing, and therefore who it makes sense to try it. All right. So, as herbalists, that’s our job, right? Get out there and do that.

Ryn (00:13:04):
Okay, so when we look at dandelion products that come in the form of a capsule, what we find there are mostly straight-up powdered herb. Sometimes you will find concentrated extracts, right? Like this is a 4:1 concentrate of dandelion root extract, or this is a 10:1 concentrate. I’ve seen products made in those manners. But what I haven’t seen, at least so far, in the marketplace of dandelion supplements is this is standardized to X percent taraxacoside or something like that. Some key constituent of the herb being looked at as the active agent in there. And we’re going to set it as a marker. And we’re going to make sure that our remedy has X percent of that, because that’s how we guarantee that it’s going to be effective for you. This is one of the herbs that doesn’t seem to have happened yet, if it’s ever going to happen at all. And so this one again, is more likely to just be powder durable material. Or maybe they made some extract and then dried it and concentrated it. But it’s not receiving that kind of standardization effect as we get with rhodiola, or St. John’s wort, or ginkgo, or other products like this. Okay.

Ryn (00:14:24):
What you will find fairly frequently for dandelion is tinctures, alcohol extracts or glycerites, right, an herbal extract either made or suspended in glycerin. Those are fairly common. And then also more than a number of other herbs that we’ve looked at in this series, the commercialized plants, you’re going to see dandelion root sold as a cut and sifted material. So dried, chopped it into pieces, sold in a bag to make tea out of it. And with the root in particular, you’ll see that fairly often. It’s not unusual for people to take that as a coffee substitute. And especially when it’s kind of sold with that idea in mind, generally they’re going to chop the roots and then roast them as that kind of changes the flavor a little bit. It does make the dandelion root a little bit less bitter. And the decoction you make from it is an inch closer to the flavor of coffee. Dandelion root coffee doesn’t taste like coffee. I don’t think almost anybody would say it’s a one-to-one substitute. It can move kind of in that direction, right? It’s bitter, it’s earthy. Okay. Yeah, sure. It can be robust. All right, fine. But coffee is something else. So, when people make an actually convincing herbal coffee substitute, the closest ones that I found include putting in some chaga or putting in some other medicinal mushrooms into there. And then sometimes I think it’s also a really good idea to include something like angelica, which has a bitter note to it but has some aromatics. Because coffee has a lot of aromatics. Dandelion root, nah, not so much, not so much. So, that that piece of the flavor and sensory profile would be really lacking. So, don’t try to pawn off roasted dandelion as a perfect coffee substitute for your friends. Because they’re going to be disappointed, and they’re not going to trust you about your suggestions next time. Okay.

Benefits of Dandelion Leaf & Root

Ryn (00:16:22):
Now, when we herbalist are working with dandelion, like I said before, we work with lots of different parts of it. We’ll work with the root, we’ll work with the leaf, we’ll work with the stem and even the flowers, right? And there are some overlapping purposes for all those different parts. And there are some distinct purposes. So, just briefly here, the root we think of primarily as a liver remedy. That it’s going to stimulate bile secretion. That it’s going to stimulate liver function in kind of a broad sense. Your liver has lots of jobs. It has to produce things, it has to store things, it has to transform things. And it has to run all of those jobs at the same time. So, dandelion is a nice, generalized, not too intense, but persistent liver activator, right? And by that I just want to say that it can enhance your liver’s capacity to metabolize things that it gets exposed to from the digestive tract coming up to the liver for filtering, if you want to say, in a very broad sense. It’s much more active than a filter, but filtering, cleaning. Investigating might be a good word because there’s a lot of immune surveillance that goes on at that stage as well. So that’s part of its function, but then also it has to produce bile. And that’s a complex substance to make. So, the liver has to work pretty hard to do that. Dandelion can enhance that capacity. It can also stimulate a little extra release of bile. And that’s where it makes sense to take dandelion before meals, right? Like other bitter herbs, you take the dandelion root. You taste the bitterness. It triggers these responses in your body. And your stomach, your liver, your pancreas, they’re all secreting their juices a little more enthusiastically. So, that can be a nice effect from that.

Ryn (00:18:08):
Dandelion root is also fibrous, and you would know that if you had one in front of you and tried to cut through it. It’s going to take a lot of work, right, especially if it’s been dried. It’s not just fresh. Some of the fibers in there are insoluble. If you just chew it up and eat it, they’re going to swallow and go right through you. Some of them are soluble. And some of them are prebiotic. Dandelion root is famous for its inulin content. Inulin is one of the most famous prebiotic fibers that we consume through herbs and foods. We find it in burdock. We find it in elecampane. We find it in sunchokes. We find it in a lot of different places. But dandelion root is a fantastic source for inulin. And when you make a decoction of dandelion root, and the water gets cloudy or quote-unquote milky as you boil it, that’s the inulin being released. You can drink that cloudy fluid. You can get the inulin into your body. And if you take a decent amount, it can have this important prebiotic effect feeding your gut flora. Feeding them preferentially, not all of them indiscriminately but basically feeding your friends. Feeding your best friends, microbes that produce butyrate and other things that are beneficial to your local intestinal health and to your broader metabolic health.

Ryn (00:19:22):
So, dandelion can be very helpful that way. Now, you do have to eat the root or decoct the root in order to get inulin. If you make a dandelion tincture. And you have dandelion root that you harvested yourself or that you bought from the herb supplier, and you soak it in alcohol for a while. You will see a cloudy, milky, white layer settling down at the bottom of your jar as it sits there macerating. That is the inulin that came out of the plant. And then it’s heavy, and it settled down to the bottom, right? The thing about tinctures though, is that you’re not going to take a lot at once. So, you’re going to take a squirt of a dandelion tincture, 10 drops. You might take a spoonful if you’re taking a big dose. But you’re not going to drink a cup of dandelion tincture or a quart of dandelion tincture in a day. And so the amount of inulin you’re actually going to receive from tincture, or for that matter from a capsule, is pretty small. If you want the inulin effect from your dandelion, make a decoction and drink a lot of it through the whole day and do that for many days consistently, or get some dandelion roots and eat them like food. Yeah.

Ryn (00:20:27):
Okay. Now, how about the leaf? So, the leaves of dandelion are another really good food. I love them in salads. They have a bitterness to them. It’s not overwhelming. It’s not so much more intense than radicchio, or something like that, or really good arugula. They have a lot of crispiness to them. They have a lot of good fiber content that you get when you eat up the leaves. They have a lot of chlorophyll, which is really beneficial to your body. They have a ton of mineral content. This herb is really good at pulling minerals up out of the soil for you. They’re fantastic, right? The leaves also have a bit of a diuretic effect. And when we prepare them as tea, you know, we do a long infusion of dandelion leaf tea. Or when we make a tincture out of dandelion leaf. The major effect from the tincture, let’s say, would be that diuretic action. Stimulation to the kidneys, it’s going to enhance elimination of certain kinds of wastes. That’s great. It’s going to do that effect I mentioned earlier about being a diuretic and draining excess fluids from your body. So, that’s all nice as long as you need it. As long as you’re not running really dry and then taking a bunch of a very diuretic herb and drying yourself out even further. Watch out for that.

Dandelion Stems & Flowers

Ryn (00:21:40):
If you want a diuretic, but maybe there’s a mixed pattern going on. We’ve got a bunch of dryness over here and a bunch of dampness over there. I don’t want only dry herbs. I don’t want only moist herbs. What do I do? We formulate, right? We have a combination. We get both effects coming in. We try to send them where they belong. Lots of steps to do in that kind of formulation. But we could begin by saying all right, I do want a diuretic for you. I do want to drain some excess fluids, but I don’t want to dry you out too much. So, your tea blend is going to be dandelion and violet, or dandelion and linden, or dandelion and marshmallow leaf, right? A lot of the same kind of calculus that we’re going to put in when we’re working with nettle leaf in different people who don’t have that very damp constitutional pattern going on. All right? Okay. So, then because the root and the leaf both have palpable bitterness to them, they can do that job of stimulating digestive secretions that I mentioned a moment ago just like any other bitter herb. All right, cool.

Ryn (00:22:42):
The stem of dandelion is a pretty mild remedy for warts and some other kinds of skin eruptions or skin irritations. What you would do for that is you would take the dandelion stem, crush it up real good, apply it to the spot. You know, you’ve got a wart on your finger, or your toe, or something. You apply it right on there, put a bandage on, keep it in place, keep it in contact with the skin, and leave it in there for several hours. You can often just do this overnight. It’s going to be the way to go. But with dandelion stem, you’ve got to do this over and over and over again for a while. This is not as potent for that job as something like greater celandine, which is much more fast-acting than dandelion stem is. But if you’ve got a lot of time, or if you have very sensitive skin. Like maybe you tried celandine for a wart before, and it irritated your tissue too much. You could try the dandelion stem thing, just don’t give up too early. Keep at it. Okay.

Ryn (00:23:37):
And then the flowers, possibly my favorite part of the dandelion plant, right? So, first off, they’re bright yellow. Why? Because they’re really saturated with carotenoids. Those are pigments that in the plant they serve some functions about protecting from UV damage and too much sunlight and so on. In us they serve antioxidant functions. They serve anti-inflammatory functions. And they protect certain kinds of tissue, including certain areas in your eyes, certain areas in the uterus. A few other spots in your body where these particular yellow pigments will actually be sequestered or concentrated because they’re essential to the function of that part of the body.

Ryn (00:24:22):
So, it’s good to get carotenoids from lots of sources. You can get them from carrots. You can get them from almost any yellow or orange-colored fruit and vegetable. Almost any, not entirely any, but most of them will have some carotenoids in there. They’re one of the many categories of antioxidant pigments that we want to be getting from our diets, from our food, and from our herbs. Dandelion flowers, especially when they’re fresh or freshly preserved, like you gather them fresh and then make a tincture out of them. I have found, and I’m not alone in this observation, that they have a bit of a mood-lifting effect. And I usually refer to that as exhilarant action. There’s another term sometimes people use called thymoleptic. It’s a pretty rare term in American herbalism. But in any case, these are herbs that can lift your mood and lift your spirits. And with the dandelion flower, I find that especially true when you prepare them as a tincture. Or if you prepare dandelion wine, which some people’s grandmothers might still know how to do. I’m sure that there are places we can go to look up instructions for that. But that is to take the dandelion flowers, and soak them in a sugar solution, and allow them to ferment and produce an alcohol. But it’s all infused with that bright, yellow goodness of the dandelion flower, lots of carotenoid activity into there.

Ryn (00:25:41):
When you make a tincture of dandelion, you do a similar extraction, right? It will be a fairly yellow tincture when you got that finished and ready to go. And I like to have dandelion flower tincture on hand for the late winter and early spring. When it’s like February, March, and it’s been gray, and rainy, and heavy skies, and cold temperatures for a long time. And we’re maybe going to come out of it soon, but it seems like the horizon keeps receding. That’s when I want dandelion flower. And I find that it does lift my mood. That it is a bit of a remedy for the seasonal affective depression kind of a thing. Yeah. So, that’s one of my favorite ways to take dandelion personally. All right, I’ve got some links for you as always. We’ve got a mini-monograph on dandelion for you. We’ve addressed dandelion in some detail previously on the Holistic Herbalism podcast. You can check out episode 220 for that. And we also have dandelion as one of our computer wallpaper and phone background options. So, I’ve got the direct link to that for you if you want to have a beautiful dandelion to look at every time you pick up your smartphone. Maybe it could remind you to go outside to the actual dandelions and spend time with them. That sounds all right to me. Yeah.

#39 Rhubarb: A Slower-Acting Astringent, Stimulant Laxative

Ryn (00:26:55):
But for now, let’s go ahead and move on and talk about rhubarb. So, rhubarb is actually an herb that I myself have worked with only to the smallest degree personally. But it is one that historically speaking was a much more everyday part of the herbalists’ work. So, this was a very important herb to the eclectic herbalists of the 1800s to early 1900s, the physiomedicalists from the same era. And then also for herbalists prior to that time in history, rhubarb was considered a very important plant. And one of the links I’ve included in the show notes for you today is to a book called the United States Dispensatory. This is from 1918. This is one of the last times that herbs were included among the quote-unquote standard medicines of the United States. And in the entry there for rhubarb, there are many, many pages of texts about rhubarb varieties, about how to assess the quality of rhubarb roots, about preservation of them. All of this before we even get to notes about the chemistry or the practical applications of the rhubarb root. And so there was just a lot of attention to detail being paid by these authors in this time about how do you know you’ve got good rhubarb root? How do you know one variety from another? When is the right time to choose one versus another? And a lot of that nuance has been lost, I would say, in contemporary herbalism, at least for most practitioners who just don’t work with rhubarb very often.

Ryn (00:28:35):
One of the reasons for that is at that time in history and in the history of herbal practice, there was much greater emphasis on laxative herbs, especially stimulant laxatives. And for this category they would use the term cathartic. And the kind of catharsis they’re talking about is not the one where you go see the really moving story, or the opera, or the ballet performance, or whatever. But they mean catharsis in the sense of we gave you a stimulant laxative. And you went to the potty and got the desired result from that, right? So, that used to be a much bigger part of what herbalists would do. And to be fair, it was also at that time a pretty big part of what the quote-unquote regular physicians were doing. And they might do that with a medicine made out of mercury. And so the herbalists were doing it with something much gentler, actually much safer. And that was actually part of the reason why there were many cases where the herbal practitioners had a better reputation among their patients than did the chemical practitioners of the day.

Ryn (00:29:40):
All right, but now we’re getting into history. So anyway, rhubarb and aloe latex, which we discussed prior in an episode in this series. Senna, which I think we just talked about in one of the more recent episodes of this sequence. We talked about this issue of the stimulant laxatives there, and how there can be concerns about somebody becoming dependent upon the stimulant laxative effect in order to have a bowel movement at all. That won’t happen from one use of senna, or aloe latex, or rhubarb root. But if you’re taking it day after day for many days at a time, you can fall into that problem, right? Now, rhubarb is a little bit separate from aloe latex and from senna in this discussion because rhubarb has a fair amount of astringency to it, which the other two don’t so much. And that’s due to the high tannin content of the plant and of the root here. And tannins work to tonify the bowels. They tighten them up. And to some extent that countervails against the peristaltic influence of the anthraquinone chemistry in the rhubarb, in the senna, in the aloe vera latex, right? Remember that the anthraquinone are the ones that stimulate those wave-like muscle contractions in the intestine and move things along. Many of these herbs also draw moisture into the intestine. When there is high tannin content present, that kind of tightens up the intestinal lining and reduces the amount of water that gets drawn in. So, it reduces that part of the effect a little bit. But that peristalsis is still going to be present.

Ryn (00:31:27):
This is actually one reason why if you look at the old writings about this, there’s a pretty heavy emphasis on if you’re going to give rhubarb root, you want to make sure the person is drinking a lot of fluids. This wouldn’t be a good herb to give to somebody who’s really dried out, even dried out through their bowels and then gives this to them on top of that. Because they’re going to have that astringency kind of keeping the bowel surface a little bit on the dry side, but they’re still going to have that muscle movement at the same time. And that kind of contraction with some dry material internally, that’s not going to feel good. That’s not going to be very nice. So, take lots of fluids if you ever consume rhubarb remedies. Yeah. But the practitioners of that day were pretty nuanced about the variations in the preparation method, the dosing that they would administer to each person. Because that can modulate which of these influences is going to dominate, the sort of movement, laxative effect or the tonification quality from the tannins. Rhubarb is also a bit different from the other stimulant laxatives because it acts more slowly. And so whereas you could take a dose of something like senna latex or Cascara sagrada, and you could expect to have bowel movements within the hour. With rhubarb it was often like you’re going to take this, but it might be six or eight hours before you have a productive bowel movement, right? So, there’s a fairly significant difference there. All right.

A Neutralizing Cordial to Aid Digestion

Ryn (00:32:56):
Another thing that you’ll notice if you look into some of these historical applications of rhubarb, especially during this period we’re talking about – late 1800s, early 1900s – is that it was a major ingredient in a remedy called neutralizing cordial. It also had some other more complicated names like Syrupus Rhei et Potassii Compositus. Or in English: compound syrup of rhubarb and potassa. So, that’s one of the links I’ve got in the show notes for you, so you can see that kind of recipe from 1898 for what was frequently just referred to from that on forward as neutralizing cordial. So, what is this stuff if you’ve never heard of it before? This is a combination of herbs and historically also some mineral content. Some potassium carbonate is what it would be. And it was a remedy for a broad array of different digestive complaints, which we can sort of see when we look at the ingredients that went into it. So, one version included goldenseal, peppermint, cinnamon, and rhubarb, and then that potassium carbonate. Now, in some presentations of this recipe, the potassium carbonate is there to be an anti-acid agent for excess stomach acid, or for heartburn if it’s actually coming from excess stomach acid. The others, when we look at that, what do we see? Well, we see a strong bitter with the goldenseal, also with a lot of mucosal astringency that’s going to manifest in the stomach especially and then to some extent in the intestines and further down. We see peppermint, a strong carminative with a lot of relaxant capacities from the menthol effect and some related compounds there. So, reducing spasms and constriction. We have cinnamon, a very warming herb and carminative for that reason, also inducing some relaxation in the muscular layers. But cinnamon also has a little bit of astringency on the mucus layers. So, kind of a mixed effect in that regard. And then the rhubarb, as we’ve been describing, has both the peristalsis influence as well as some tannin astringency for the intestinal lining.

Ryn (00:35:09):
So, you put all of that together into a remedy, and that would be given for a really wide variety of digestive issues. And variations of this formula are still a mainstay of practice for a number of herbalists today. They might use it or work with it straight up as it is. They might include it in a kit that they’re going to bring to do first aid work or things like that. Or it might be taken where we’re going to have this ready-to-go, premixed formula. And then we’re going to add that to a specific formula made for this individual in this moment, right? So, we’re going to take a base of neutralizing cordial. And then for you, ah, you run on the cold and damp side. So, we’re going to take that, we’re going to bump in another two parts worth of ginger tincture or ginger syrup. And that’s going to be the remedy that we’re going to put for you specifically, right? Or for somebody else we’re going to go with wild cherry syrup, or we’re going to go with centaury tincture, or whatever else it is that we’re going to blend in for the individual. The herbalist Michael Moore referred to this as the single closest thing to a universal gastrointestinal tonic, right? So, that’s kind of the idea with neutralizing cordial. In a sense trying to touch lightly on several different predictable trouble spots through the GI tract and through those organs. All right Now, in contrast to all of that, the contemporary framing for rhubarb products tends to focus on the stimulant laxative effect. But, and it won’t surprise you given the introduction today, these are generally framed simply as detox functions. We are going to detoxify you. We are going to cleanse you. And you’ll see it turn up here and there in those products with that orientation. Okay. So, enough said about that.

Rhubarb’s Unclear Role in Hormonal Support

Ryn (00:37:10):
Another note though, some rhubarb products, and especially combination formulae that include rhubarb as one of the ingredients, they might indicate that this remedy, this supplement is there to quote, support hormonal balance or to provide some relief from symptoms of menopause. When you see a product like that, and when they specify any particular chemistry or standardization, you’re going to see that they focus on two constituents. Most of the time the major ones are called rhaponticin and they deoxy rhaponticin. And these, according to laboratory science, they exert some degree of phytoestrogenic activity. So, that would be the role that this would be playing in a quote-unquote menopause formula, right? It wouldn’t be oh, you’ve got menopause? Let me give you a laxative. It would be oh, you’ve got menopause? Well, can I give you herbal estrogens? And looking at these constituents from this herb, from this root and saying well, these seem to be like herbal estrogens. Let’s give those and see what kind of effects we get, right? So, when you dig through some studies about this, you’ll find that certain proprietary, which is to say secret methods for preparing an extract from rhubarb centered on these two constituents, have shown some promising results in some studies, right? People feeling some relief from certain symptoms, fewer hot flashes, not as severe, better able to sleep through the night. Okay, cool.

Ryn (00:38:44):
But what I did notice is that the concentrations and the preparation methods that are used there, they might differ really significantly from what’s available to the consumer. So, for instance, one of the only studies I was able to find that was directly about humans taking an extract or a preparation of rhubarb root to see if it would improve their menopause symptoms. It was all prepared in a very specific way. It had, I think, two or three times the concentration of those constituents as the commercialized products that I was able to see on Amazon orienting themselves to this purpose. And it was prepared in what you call an enteric-coated capsule. Which means that it’s not going to open in the stomach the way most capsules do. It’s going to hold until it gets down deeper into the intestines, and then it’s going to open and deliver its chemistry out there. So, it’s entirely possible that the effects observed in that particular trial would not be replicable by this menopause formula that includes rhubarb roots that you can go buy on Amazon today. It may be that the one that you can buy for yourself is a little less potent than the one that they studied, or something else like that might be going on. But at the moment it’s kind of unclear. We would need more data, and we would actually need more clarity around the way the commercial products are actually made before we could make that judgment. All right. And again, if you’ve been listening to this series for a while, you can probably sing along with what I just said. Because these are repeated comments that we have to make over and over again about herbal supplement products as they exist in the marketplace.

Ryn (00:40:34):
All right, one last comment. I just want to come back to the cathartic thing, the stimulant laxative thing, right? I would say, and I’m not alone in this, but I would say that all cathartics like this should be avoided if a person is suffering from inflammatory bowel diseases like Crohn’s disease, or celiac disease, or ulcerative colitis. Even if that person has constipation, it’s not a great idea for them to take the stimulant laxatives. They could work with yellow dock safely. They can definitely work with marshmallow, seaweeds fibers, hydrating herbs, demulcent, yes, good move. But the stimulant laxatives are not a good move when there is damage, erosion, or ulceration in the bowels or in the GI tract at large. Better to avoid in those circumstances. Okay.

#40 Ginseng: Natural Energy & Chemistry

Ryn (00:41:36):
All right, number 40 on the bestselling list was ginseng. Now, ginseng has moved up and down its position on the bestseller list on the mainstream channel, on the natural channel over the years. If you scroll back, or you look back through the prior years of the herbal market report, ginseng will turn up at different spots on there. But it’s almost always on there, right? And if we had a bestselling herbs list from a hundred years ago, we would see ginseng in one form or another on that list, right? This has been a top-selling herb for hundreds of years in global commerce and thousands of years in China where it originates from. Or for the American ginseng version, it was certainly an important herb to humans from the moment that they made it to that part of the world, right? It’s an herb with an incredible reputation, right, second to none. So, the market presentation you’re going to find for the majority of ginseng products today is going to be focused on natural energy. It’s going to be focused on performance. It’s going to be focused on athleticism. Sometimes you’re also going to see it focused on cognitive performance or focus as well. Now, like almost every herb we’ve talked about, its historical applications have been significantly broader than that, right? And these have included both long-term effects to sustain, to activate the life force and all the different manifestations of it inside the body and beyond, as well as acute-term applications and even some emergency applications in traditional medicine, and folk medicine, and contemporary true herbalism as well.

Ryn (00:43:26):
Now, ginseng products in the marketplace today, they do take a wide array of different forms, and formats, and preparations, and methods, right? And that does include several standardized extracts. With ginseng, when a product is standardized, it’s usually going to be standardized to either the whole group or specific members of this group called ginsenosides. And there are varying degrees of specificity that the product manufacturers will give you. Sometimes they’ll just say we guarantee X percent ginsenoside content. Some of them will be more specific and be like well, we’re going to guarantee X percent of ginsenoside Rb and Y percent of ginsenoside Rg. These are just labels for the different members of the group, right? But in general, you’re going to see if there’s going to be some standardization, it’s going to be about the ginsenoside content. These are steroidal saponins, which we’ve seen from eleuthero, we’ve seen from ashwagandha in other contexts. They turn up very frequently in adaptogenic herbs. They contribute to the adaptogenic effects of the plant. I don’t want to say that they are responsible solely for the adaptogenic effects of the plant. Because I, like most herbalists, believe that the whole synergy of the whole plant is what gives you the whole effect, right? And so there are other interesting chemistries to be found beyond the ginsenosides. Just like in ashwagandha, it was more than just the withanolide content, right? That that is responsible for the action there. But they are certainly the most well researched and the most highly attended elements of what we find in there.

Ryn (00:45:24):
Now, I’ve been speaking generically about ginseng so far. And that’s because in this market report, the two primary species of ginseng and some other less famous species as well are all collapsed into this one entry. So, this is just listed as ginseng, Panax spp., right? So, spp., whenever you see that in a botanical name, it means species, plural. So, they’re saying any of the species, any of the plants that are in the Panax group, they’re going to be included here in our calculation, in our tally of sales, right? But to the herbalist, it’s actually pretty important that we differentiate which species we’re talking about. So, let’s break it down a little bit. The primary ones are going to be the Asian and American ginseng.

Ryn (00:46:18):
So, Asian ginseng, it’s botanical name is Panax ginseng. It’s the original, right? And this one, traditionally speaking, the main focus for this would be conditions or situations in which vitality was low. Vitality in a general sense: life force, qi, prana, whatever name you prefer to give to that. So, that could be someone who was an elder, and the life force was naturally fading, but we want to sustain that for as long as we can, okay? It could be somebody who was chronically ill in contemporary parlance. Maybe infirmed is an older word people would use for that, right? It could be someone recovering from an illness or an injury. That can take time, and that can definitely sap your vitality. We want to build strength, we want to provide a little extra life fire to somebody. That would be a situation to give ginseng. And then it is true that in certain circumstances this would also be done to enhance fire and energy in an otherwise healthy person.

Ryn (00:47:21):
And so historically that might be framed around war and combat. And in the modern world, it’s more often framed around athletic performance or in some cases really long hours of work. Yeah, adaptogens, this is how they go, right? They have kind of gone over time from this is an herb we give to somebody who’s very important to our society, and is starting to flag and fail, and we want to support them and bring them back to life as much as we can. And it has become how hard can we push these workers? How many breaks do we really need to give them, right? What if we give ginseng to these laborers? Can they work twice as long? Hmm, let’s find out. So, sometimes that’s done to people. And there have been a number of large-scale studies about the effects of adaptogens where they’ve been done to people. Putting them into really rough circumstances and seeing how well they survive if you give them ginseng, or you give them eleuthero. And then, you know, sometimes we do it to ourselves. And sometimes we’re like well, I could rest. But I could just take a ginseng product, and maybe I’ll have more energy today, and I can keep going. Yeah, sometimes we do it to ourselves, right?

The Original Adaptogen & Safety Considerations

Ryn (00:48:31):
But look, ginseng does have this capacity to help the body cope with a stressor, whether it’s acute, or whether it’s long term. It does have this capacity to enable you to cope with your stressors, to adapt to them more smoothly, more readily, and to continue on and to survive from moment to moment. And so it is the original adaptogen. It’s true, right? Let’s just say though, this is a stimulating adaptogen. This is a stimulating herb, especially, especially in the more concentrated and the standardized forms that are available today. Even more so if it’s then combined with other stimulants, which could be a polyherbal formula, right? If we take Asian ginseng, and we take eleuthero, and we take rhodiola, and we take fo-ti, excuse me, he shou wu, right? If we take those and combine all of them together, we’ve got multiple different kinds of stimulation coming in. Or if we take ginseng, and we combine it with coffee or other caffeine sources. Or we combine it with ephedra, right, another kind of a stimulant chemistry. That is much more likely to cause problems. Much more likely to cause problems of overstimulation, excess heat, excess dryness, agitation, headache, insomnia, anxiety. All of these things can result simply from excessive intake of ginseng. But they’re more likely to happen if it’s ginseng plus a bunch of other stimulants, herbal, chemical, whatever. It can happen. And it’s also as always relative to the individual’s constitution and their current state. So, somebody who’s already more hot, more dry, more agitated, more of a choleric temperament, more of a pitta dosha, whatever language you like to use for this. That person is going to be closer to the edge of ginseng adverse effects than somebody who runs cold, who runs damp, who’s sluggish, who’s slow, more of a phlegmatic, more of a kapha type, right? That individual is going to have a much broader range of safe or appropriate ginseng doses that they can work with before they’re ever going to encounter some of these adverse effects that come from being overheated, being overstimulated, being dried out.

Ryn (00:51:00):
Now, back in the 80s and even into the 70s, there were a few scientific papers that were put out there when ginseng was kind of newish in a sense to the sort of American population. Let’s just say maybe it was newly popularized in the form of supplements and over-the-counter products, okay. So, at that time there were a few papers that were put out about something called ginseng abuse syndrome. And they were identifying some of the same potential symptoms that I was just naming: anxiety, headache, insomnia, agitation, things like that as well as high blood pressure and a few other elements. So, some of the studies that were written up about quote-unquote ginseng abuse syndrome, there was a lot to critique about them. And herbalists had many critiques to give then and now. Basically saying that these studies were underpowered for the claims they were making. There was also a significant, serious, and entirely predictable problem with them. Which was that there was a lack of clarity about what each individual that was being reported upon had actually taken. Because they were just like we saw people who took ginseng had high blood pressure. Well, okay, what did it mean to quote, take ginseng in that circumstance? Were they buying actual ginseng roots from a trusty supplier, making a decoction of three slices prepared each day, and drinking that every day for months at a time? Or were they buying some product from some kind of seller making something that they claimed was a ginseng extract, but who knows what was actually in it? Maybe caffeine, maybe some other weird chemistry, maybe ginseng, maybe not. A lot of uncertainty around that.

Ryn (00:52:51):
And so these studies that were reporting this ginseng abuse syndrome, there’s a lot of critique to be made for them, right? And in general the consensus is that what was being observed by those people was essentially a problem of poor products or poor combinations of a ginseng product and a ton of caffeine, or a ginseng product and quote-unquote diet pills, or something like that leading to some of these more serious adverse event reports. And so a lot of people kind of consider this issue to be solved. Because now we’ve got better clarity about proper plant identification. And there are steps that are being taken and monitoring groups that are trying to prevent adulteration of supplement products. And we’ve got materials and methods in place to catch that and to make sure it doesn’t happen so much, right? But I would just point out that none of this means that all doses and all preparations of ginseng are safe for all people. The motivation to produce a supposedly herbal, all-natural remedy that supposedly contains ginseng but is actually adulterated with a chemical stimulant, or a cheaper herb, or whatever else, that all remains as strong as it ever was. Okay?

Ryn (00:54:14):
And beyond that, humans love stimulants, and they love to combine their stimulants. And they don’t always think o hmm, if I’ve had six cups of coffee today and I take this 20x concentrate ginseng extract tablet, is that going to be a problem for me? People don’t tend to think that way. They think I drink coffee because it helps me to not feel like a zombie. And I’m still kind of tired, and I need a little bit of an extra boost. And maybe I can take this ginseng capsule and get it, right? So, herbalists, this is our job, right? We have to try to spread the word for people and let them know listen. If you’re already hot, and agitated, and on edge, then maybe you don’t need red ginseng today, right? If you are actually depleted, maybe you work with ginseng instead of caffeine for a while, right, and see if that does a little bit better job for you. So, these are things that it’s on us to share and to teach to other people.

Varieties of Ginseng

Ryn (00:55:09):
Okay. A couple other thoughts on Asian ginseng. So, you’ll sometimes see products that are being sold as red ginseng and white ginseng. And you might think are these different species? Are they different flower colors? Like what’s going on here? But they’re actually both from the same plant. They’re from Panax ginseng, and they’re about preparation. So, when you get white ginseng, that means that you had the root. You sliced it, you dried it, and that’s it. Now you have that. Red is where it’s been sliced, but then it was quote cured, or some people say fermented. Probably a better word, would be oxidized. But it’s going to be steamed. It’s going to be exposed to damp heat and then maybe dried fast or maybe smoked. Or there’s different things that are done at that point. But the steaming process does actually change the color of the root and make it more red. And so therefore it’s called red ginseng, okay. Now they’re from the same plant, but the process does change the chemistry a little bit. So, the white ginseng is significantly less stimulating in comparison to the red. This is why red ginseng is much more popular, okay? Now, there are many regional varieties, and you’ll sometimes see those named or stamped on the product. It will say this is Korean red ginseng, or this is Manchurian ginseng, or something like that. Regional varieties, again, are going to be the same species. Call it Asian ginseng broadly, call it Panax ginseng if you use the botanical name. That’s what they’re talking about. But let’s be clear, local ecology can produce some variation in chemistry. And so if somebody was coming forth and saying no, actually for this particular purpose, what you really want is ginsenoside Rf, and you want to get tons and tons of that. And this variety of ginseng grown in this microclimate makes more ginsenoside Rf than the others. Like okay, maybe there’s an argument to be made for something like that. But for most products, that’s not going to come up. And for most people, that’s not going to be necessary for you to work with ginseng and get the benefits you want. Yeah. All right.

Ryn (00:57:18):
Okay. So, American ginseng then. American Ginseng is a Panax species, but it’s Panax quinquefolius, okay? It’s the species that’s native to North America and it’s significantly less heating than Asian ginseng. Some herbalists will go so far as to say Asian ginseng is a heating herb. American ginseng is a cooling herb. Other herbalists would say well look, Asian ginseng is strongly heating. American ginseng is only weakly heating, but it is on that side of the spectrum. So, I think in some senses that’s kind of like where do you define your center? Like where do you press the tare button on your scale? Where do you define the zero point for that? And I think honestly for a lot of people, that the determinant factor there is going to be their own constitution. And so people who run hot tend to work with American ginseng and experience it as cooling. And people who run more on the cool side might work with either ginseng and say these actually warm me up and liberate some energy for me. But the Asian ginseng does it a lot more than the American does, right? So, these are just some ways to think about nuances in report about energetics. Because this is something that we base off of our sensory perceptions, and our sensory perceptions do differ from each other, sometimes in predictable ways. And we need to think ourselves through that whole process if we want to draw on this source of knowledge in a thoughtful and informed manner.

Ryn (00:58:54):
Now, American ginseng in Chinese medicine is at least as revered and coveted as Asian ginseng is from the moment that there was global commerce and there was transfer of American ginseng roots from the eastern forests across the world to China. And they looked at the plant and said yeah, this is a ginseng. This is a man root. This is a good plant. We want to work with it. It was recognized that this was a really good remedy, but also that it was different. So, in traditional Chinese medicine terms, the American ginseng would be considered a yin tonic and a blood tonic. Whereas the Asian ginseng would be considered a yang tonic and a qi tonic. And so we could get into the terminology. And we could spend hours or maybe years talking about what exactly is meant by each of these terms, and how do they manifest, and so on. So, just for a very simple transliteration of that, we could say that American ginseng has greater capacity as a restorative and a regenerative agent. Where the Asian ginseng is more of a stimulant and more of an invigorating kind of a remedy. Yeah, I think that’s the simplest way to compare the two of them. A lot of people have commented, and not just in recent years but even 50, even a hundred years ago, that for city dwellers or people with a very high-stress lifestyle, it makes more sense to take the American ginseng than the Asian. Because you don’t necessarily need more stimulation on top of all your agitation. Maybe what you just need is a little bit more of fluid flow, a little bit more of a capacity to access calm and to maintain with that. And that the American ginseng would actually be better able to bring that to you.

Ryn (01:00:58):
So, you know, these two are often just discussed in the same breath, in the way that this herb market report is just listing them as Panax species. That’s often done in products as well. My favorite example of this ever was actually a little chocolate product that you would see right near the checkout register when you go to the store. And I don’t think it’s available anymore. But it was like, I forget what they called it, but they were clearly advertising this is chocolate with ginseng in it. It’s going to give you energy. It’s going to give you focus. It’s going to help you cope with stress. And the give you energy thing was definitely part of the marketing presentation, and the colors, and the symbols on the thing, and all of that, right? And so I looked at it, and I was like oh, they must be using Asian ginseng, right? They want a stimulant. But then I read the label, and they actually specified Panax quinquefolius. And I said huh, that’s a little bit misleading, but it’s probably for the good. Because most of the people who are looking for energy in the form of a chocolate that they can grab as they rush out of the store, they would probably be better off taking the American ginseng product actually. So, I thought that was sneaky but maybe more appropriate. Yeah. It could have just been that that was the material that they had access to. Who even knows? But I still think about that whenever I think about Asian and American ginseng.

Ryn (01:02:26):
So yeah, again, those are the two main species you’re going to run into. There are others. There are other species of Panax. There’s like maybe a dozen, maybe nine. People argue about this. You know how taxonomist can get. One that’s a clearly defined different species unto itself is called Panax notoginseng. This was previously known as Panax pseudoginseng, like false ginseng, okay? It’s usually referred to as tian qi ginseng. And it’s a closely related species. It does share a lot of overlap in terms of chemistry. By the way, I should have said before, Panax quinquefolius does contain ginsenosides, right? A different ratio, a different composition of them in comparison to Panax ginseng itself. But they both contain ginsenosides and so does Panax notoginseng. It’s maybe a little bit lighter. It’s maybe not quite as stimulating, not quite as potent. Not as much of a tonic herb as either of those two major species are. But it is considered an important remedy. It does have some other applications entirely though in traditional medicine, including a remedy which is really a first aid remedy. It’s called yunnan baiyao. And that was taken or is taken – like you can still go and buy that – for acute injuries like swelling, bleeding, pain. You can take this, and it will bring that down. It has some interesting capacity to modulate blood clotting. Like if somebody is bleeding, they can take this, and it can slow down the bleeding and help it to clot faster. But also if there’s blood stagnation in an area, then it can break that up and get that moving again. A complicated herb, interesting herb.

Ryn (01:04:12):
And you know, honestly, that’s fair to say for all of the ginsengs because I’ve given very short shrift to the medicinal virtues of ginseng today. That’s not the major focus of this presentation. But there are libraries worth of books just about ginsengs and tons of different applications for them, different preparation methods to draw out this or that feature. And you find that both in formal herbal literature, primarily in in China but also in in western herbal literature as well. You also find that in folk practice. So, the herbalist Phyllis Light from down in Alabama, I’ve heard her say several times that her… Ooh, I forget which exact, so I’ll just say one of her relatives. She considered him to be an herbalist, but he only had two herbs in his whole life. And for most of his life only one herb, and that was American ginseng. And he would work with it in different ways for a cold, or joint pain, or fatigue, or this kind of chronic illness versus that one. Including different preparation methods for internal consumption, including topical preparations, including working with different parts of the plant, and all of those oriented towards each particular application. So, I think that’s a way to emphasize, like that story is a way to encapsulate and to emphasize that these herbs are complex, multifaceted. They’re not as simple as herbs for energy. They’re not at all as simple as herbs for stress in a fully-developed folk or traditional perspective upon them. So, I can only give little hints of that in my format today, but I do want to try to make that as clear as I can given those constraints. All right.

Other Plants Called Ginseng

Ryn (01:06:08):
Couple other notes on ginseng. From one thing, many other plants are sometimes referred to as X ginseng or adjective ginseng. And that’s always done to draw on the reputation, the cachet, the aura of the original ginsengs, right? So, some examples. Poor man’s ginseng, you’ve heard me talk about that as jiaogulan, right, Gynostemma pentaphyllum. That’s a leafy plant from Southeast Asia, which does actually produce ginsenosides. And so it does have some chemical connection to the true ginsengs, but it’s in a different plant family. It’s just a separate herb, right? And we can think about it differently. Eleuthero, which I mentioned in a previous episode in this sequence, Eleutherococcus senticosus, that’s been referred to as Siberian ginseng. And that used to be done so frequently that there was actually some legislation put in place here in the United States to say that if you want to put the name ginseng on your product, it has to contain a Panax species. Otherwise you can’t do that anymore, right? But people will still kind of break the rules for marketing, and label claims, and website advertisements, and so on. And so you’ll still see today people advertising Siberian ginseng. And they don’t mean Panax grown in Siberia, they mean Eleutherococcus. Yeah. Okay. Can you guess which plant has been referred to as Indian ginseng? Ashwagandha, right, Withania somnifera. Because it’s an adaptogen. Because it’s an herb that can help people cope with stress. Because it’s a fantastic herb that a lot of people get a lot of benefit from. And if we can advertise it as a ginseng, why not, right? That used to be a little more common. It’s kind of reduced now. But I think that’s simply because the name ashwagandha has started to become more familiar to more people. Okay. There’s a plant called suma or Hebanthe eriantha, which in some older books you’re going to see under the name Pfaffia paniculata. That one for a while and in some cases is referred to as Brazilian ginseng. Maca, Lepidium meyenii has sometimes been called Peruvian ginseng. And devil’s club, Oplopanax horridus, has sometimes been called Alaskan ginseng.

Ryn (01:08:43):
So, not all of these are ginseng. Most of these are adaptogens. The devil’s club, that one I’m really not sure about. I haven’t gotten a chance to work with enough of it to have my own opinion. Most of the others, jiaogulan, eleuthero, ashwagandha, suma, maca, most of those qualify as adaptogens, especially if you’re not being too strict about the definition. But you can see what’s happening here, right? Somebody finds an herb, especially an herb that has that kind of polycrest or panacea reputation. And they say well, where are we? Where does it grow? Okay, put that in front. Put ginseng after that. We’re going to make a million. Yeah. So, just be aware of those things. Generally not true ginseng’s. And my last note is probably obvious at this point, but just be very picky. Be very discerning about where you get your ginseng or your ginseng remedy from. There are a lot of poor-quality products that claim to be made of ginseng out there in the marketplace and out there on the internet. They may be adulterated with other plants. They may be adulterated with other quote-unquote X ginseng herbs. They might be adulterated with some other herb entirely. They might be adulterated with sawdust, okay? They might be adulterated with caffeine, or ephedrine, or some other herbal stimulant. So, those things happen a lot because people want ginseng. And as long as people have wanted ginseng, there has been somebody out there trying to sell them something and claim it’s ginseng, but it really wasn’t. I mean, you can read texts from hundreds of years ago saying beware. Because unscrupulous vendors will take a young ginseng root and tie cords around it as it dries to make it look more wrinkled like an old ginseng root, right? Because generally the older the root is, the more valuable it is, the more potent the medicine is, right? So, this is not a new problem, right? But it is one that probably won’t ever actually go away. And it’s one more reason to be very again, thoughtful, picky, discerning, or even maybe demanding of your herbal suppliers to know that it’s ginseng. Here’s a simple one. If it’s cheap, it’s probably not ginseng. Or if it does contain some ginseng, maybe there’s like a drop of it in the ocean of what you’re buying, right? Like a tiny little amount, but not enough to actually do anything for you. That’s pretty common as well when it comes to ginseng. So, be picky, be thoughtful about it. If you want to work with ginseng, you should be willing to pay a little bit more for the good quality stuff. That’s how it goes.

Ryn (01:11:31):
Okay, I think that’s it for today. So, thanks for listening. We have come to the end of the mainstream channel list. I am going to do a little bit more on this series. I’ll try not to drag it out too much longer, but there are a number of herbs that turned up on the quote-unquote natural channel list that I thought were interesting and didn’t turn up on the mainstream list. And so I wanted to address those as well. So, I’ll do an episode or two on that topic. And then there was a few other noteworthy herbs of commerce that weren’t on this particular version of the bestseller list but have been other times. Or for other reasons I wanted to make sure and do an episode about. So, there will be some more top-selling herbs herbalists’ view episode comments coming. But we’ll also have some other topics and some other subjects come up on the podcast feed for you in the next few episodes.

Ryn (01:12:27):
So, we hope you’ll keep us in your in your list. We hope that you’ll like, and subscribe, and all of that kind of stuff so that you get updates when we have some new material for you. Really appreciate that. Remember that does also make it more likely for other people to find our content and to get some good, helpful information about herbs. So that they can be well-informed as herbalists, or as consumers, or as both because aren’t we all? Yeah. All right, one last thought before we go. Detox came up in this episode a couple times with the dandelion, with the rhubarb. You’ve heard it come up in other episodes in this sequence. And so I just wanted to make one more reminder that we do have a whole course all about our view on detoxification. What it is, how it works, how we can enhance it, what gets in the way of it. And methods of working with holistic interventions around food, around sleep, around movement, around stress management, and around actual herbs to help your body to cope with toxins, metabolic wastes, overload of all different kinds. And to make sure that those systems are humming along in the best possible way. So, if that interests you, you can check out our course: Elements of Detoxification. I break it down into a very simple way to understand these ideas and to orient according to an elemental compass. So, I think it should be something that is both clear and also actionable for you to put into your own life.

Ryn (01:13:56):
And like every other course that we offer at our online herbalism school, it’s a self-paced video course. You go through it on your own schedule. You have access to it for life. It’s not like on a countdown timer. You’ve got to complete everything in two weeks, and then it disappears from you. You have it as long as the internet exists and we’re on it, you have access to your course material. You also get free access to our twice-weekly live Q&A sessions. You get twice weekly… Nope, that’s what I just said. Okay. And there’s also open discussion threads and every lesson in the course. So that if you’ve got a question, you can type it right up, put it in there. You get an answer from our staff and from us. You get access to our student community. There’s study guides, there’s quizzes, there’s a capstone at the end, all that kind of good stuff. So, I think it’s fantastic. And if you’re into detox or you want to know more about it, then I hope you’ll check it out. I’ve got the link in the show notes. That’s going to be it for today. One more time, thank you for listening. Take care of yourselves. Take care of each other. Drink some tea. And if it’s ginseng, make sure it really is ginseng. All right, bye.