Herbal Medicine
Try as we will to escape nature she keeps pulling us back. We flee to cities, reject her vital foods and eventually dissipate our life force so badly we end up being sick. The Cherokee Indians believed that the animals created illness to stop the spread of man and the plants overheard them and had a council. Each plant decided to be the medicine for a particular disease.
Herbs are now not really important to pharmaceutical business as you can not make massive revenues for shareholders with them. But you can use them for effective and permanent healing. Herbalists have been successfully using plants and their curative powers long before the time of Christ. In fact for centuries they were all we had to treat disease with.
If our elite drug companies were to trace their lineage they might blush to discover that the guiding principle of what they do was the inspired idea of a 16th centaury herbalist doctor who was variously described as a visionary and a drunken fool called Paracelsus. He thought that healing properties were "concealed in things". By discovering these healing properties one would find the answer to diseases. Discovering the active component of the plant was only half the answer to complete and effective healing.
But he had to find the plants that would heal disease and the only way to do this and build up any knowledge was to use the doctrine of signatories and contraries. All of the herbs that we now use were once discovered using these principals. Signatories is when you watch a sick animal eating particular plants and it has since been found that those plants have particular curative properties for the sickness the animal had..
Contraries on the other hand is seeing in nature plants that look like as disease, as is the case in pileworth - the roots of the plant look like piles and when you apply the plant extract to human piles they heal. In fact Yves Rocher started his whole cosmetics empire making creams with pileworth extract.
To a herbalist it is irrational to extract an active chemical isolate from a plant and throw away 70 chemical compounds that help regulate its effect in the body. Chemical isolates from ergot or foxglove form important components in medicine. The search for new medicines will continue amongst plants.
Some of the best herbs for your health can be found in your kitchen. One of the most effective ways of taking herbs is in the tincture form. This is an alcoholic extract of the herb that can be taken with water. Otherwise most herbs are taken as a tea or as a capsule of standardised extract.
Garlic
This herb is most responsible for the renewed interest in herbal medicine and supplements more than any other. When a German chemist found ways of making a dried extract, he started a company from his garage that sells £20 million garlic supplements per year. Long used as a treatment for lung infections, garlic now is known to be a valuable tool in the treatment of heart disease. Scientifically proven to reduce cholesterol, reduce blood pressure and make the blood less sticky which reduces the risk of clots.
Lemon balm
The Greeks used this herb to improve the memory, relieve headaches and overcome depression. The most exciting modern use is in the use as an anti viral. Use of the herb will also strengthen the immune system.
Rhodiola Root
Otherwise known as artic root this herb has widely been used in the treatment of mental illness in Russia and is used there to balance pharmaceutical drugs by psychiatrists. By far the best herb for depression as it acts like the drugs used to treat depression. Rhodiola's popularity owes much to it being a major ingredient in many love potions. In the polar arctic regions of eastern Siberia, it is said that Rhodiola will increase vigour and promote long life. The Russian Government has been supplying it to athletes, soldiers and politicians for years. Adaptogens are herbs that help normalise body chemistry and help increase resistance to or adaptation to stress of all kinds. People taking Rhodiola exhibited increased levels of Beta-endorphin, a stress relieving, feel-good, analgesic peptide.
Agnus castus
This herb has immense importance to women, especially those with PMT (premenstrual tension). When I have suggested to my female clients with PMT symptoms to start using the tincture, they reported consistently that physical symptoms such as cramp, breast soreness and nausea - disappeared. The emotional teariness also left returning to them on average three months of life over a year to enjoy. The herb works by balancing the progesterone and oestrogen levels in the body.
Milk Thistle
This has to be the best herb that I have used to detox and rejuvenate my client's livers. The herb has been used since the 1700's when it was sited by the famous English herbalist Culpeper for the treatment of liver disorders. Containing a compound called silymarin which protects the liver from poisonous toxins it also has the ability to regenerate liver cells.
Valarian
In the 18th centaury this herb became widely accepted in the treatment of anxiety and insomnia. Valarian is calming without causing drowsiness. As a mild sedative it helps restore regular sleep patterns in those suffering from insomnia. Valerian also does not have any of the morning sleepiness associated with certain drugs that are used to treat insomnia.
Peppermint
Widely know as the best herb in the treatment of digestive disorders. For indigestion, gastric discomfort, irritable bowel syndrome, flatulence or colic peppermint is a must. This is why you get peppermint sweets after dinner in restaurants. Headaches are also relieved by drinking peppermint tea. In ayurvedic medicine the herb is used to cool heat disorders and generally it is an overall vitality tonic taken as a tea.