Resonant Herbs

How cool is this? And it features some of my favorite herbal businesses!

It has been a long time since I've posted anything to my page. I wanted to update that I do free health consultations Saturday mornings at the Honest Weight Food Co-op in Albany, NY. You can sign up by calling the front desk. I also wanted to post some thoughts I've had about some trends in natural healing that I have known about for many years but hadn't given much thought to until they affected my life. Many herbalists and other natural healers (such as chiropractors) a...re resorting to a practice called dowsing. Traditionally, it has been touted as an effective way to locate water, but having a strong and devoted background to science I had honestly kind of rolled my eyes at the practice until it fell in my lap during an herb class on Lyme treatment I was taking three years ago. For the sake of the class, I decided to dowse for the duration of the course, planning to only do it a few days while I learned the techniques of the respected and well-known herbalist teacher. Without going into detail, I have decided I can't ethically go forward in my life without stressing that I recommend all should avoid dowsing, any form of divination and all practitioners that use it and please teach your children to steer clear of the practices as well. This is information our great-grandmothers knew and our moms (understandably) laughed at in the name of science and my generation for the most part is oblivious to (I was). Firstly, we do not need outside help to make decisions. Humans have the capacity to make intelligent and information based decisions for care and if your practitioner or doctor feels that they need to look to an unknown source for help they should not be practicing. Don't be afraid to ask your natural health practitioner whether they use dowsing to help decide how to treat you. My other thoughts are: don't invite what you don't understand into your life, you can look up in the sky on a dark night and know there is way more than we can imagine out there. It may be beautiful up there, but it is not necessarily all good. When any form of divination is undertaken, whether it be Ouigi or dowsing, it is like opening a door to the unknown that you cannot willingly close. See more

When I am feeling powerless in my life, I put seeds into the ground.

Saying that a particular herb is anti-inflammatory is a bit misleading. What herbs that are "anti-inflammatory" actually do is down regulate inflammatory cytokines. If the type of cytokines reduced by an ingested herb are not specific to your condition, the herb won't benefit you in the intended manor. Part of what I try to do is match herbs with the cytokines that are overactive. This can be true in autoimmune conditions but also in the case of infections in which cascades of cytokines are created. These "cascades" are essentially a positive feedback loop in which microorganisms use inflammation to further infect the host (as can be seen in sepsis). I have been spending quite a lot of time reviewing research articles to determine novel herbs for infectious conditions.