Awakened Conscious Conversations
Healing the world one episode at a time by offering realistic solutions to the journey of life. Both self hosted ( By The Gentle Yoga Warrior) and guest episodes.
Many of our guests have overcome significant obstacles and transformed their lives.
Rich with deep talks and solo endeavours, often offering tips on living a more conscious life.
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Awakened Conscious Conversations
Silicon: The Forgotten Macronutrient
Journey into the forgotten world of silicon, an essential macronutrient that might be the missing key to optimal health and vitality. Clinical herbalist Bonnie D'Arcangelo guides us through a fascinating exploration of this overlooked element and its profound impact on our bodies.
Bonnie shares her remarkable personal journey from the fashion industry to living in a log cabin without running water, where she forged her deep connection with nature and healing practices. This spiritual awakening led her to discover the power of silicon—a fundamental building block for our bones, cartilage, elastin, and tissues throughout the body.
What makes this conversation truly mind-expanding is Bonnie's explanation of water's fourth state: plasma. Through her pioneering work, Bonnie has developed silicon plasma hydrates that mimic our body's natural state, allowing for deeper penetration and more effective delivery of herbal medicines.
Her philosophy of collaborative medicine—bridging conventional treatments with herbal wisdom—offers a vision for healthcare that honors our complete being.
Ready to discover the forgotten element that might transform your understanding of health? Listen now and reclaim this ancient wisdom for modern wellness.
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Hello everybody, I'm your host, the Gentle Yoga Warrior, and this is Awaken Conscious Conversations podcast, and shortly joining us, all the way from Michigan, is Bonnie D'Arcangelo, and Bonnie is going to speak to us today about silicon, the forgotten macronutrient, and I know a little bit about naturopath herbalology et cetera, just from actually having been a patient, but that's about as much as I know. So this is a subject matter that I'm not an expert on, so it makes it really interesting in many ways to hear what Bonnie has got to say. But Bonnie is an expert. She's a clinical herbalist, holistic health consultant with masters of science and herbal medicine, certified aromatherapist, national association of holistic aromatherapy. She is the co-founder of a company and I'm probably going to pronounce this wrong, but I'm going to give it my best. It's e-verbal, e-verbal, but I'm sure that bonnie will clarify that when she comes on. And Bonnie also does something really amazing she is the president and founder of a Michigan's Protection of Michigan Protections, a non-profit focused on restoring native medical plants in Michigan.
Speaker 1:I just want to talk all about how silicon is the forgotten macro nutrient and I think it's going to be really intriguing to to find out. But you were joining shortly from Michigan, so everybody, as promised, joining us all the way from Michigan is Bonnie de Archangel. Hi, bonnie, welcome to the show. Hi Dane, thank you for having me. Oh, I'm so excited to have you on the show today, especially because I know we're going to talk about silicon, the forgotten macronutrient, and normally have a bit of an idea on the subject matter, and the only parts I know about nutrition basically is when I've been to see a nutritionist myself. So you're going to, I'm sure, shed a lot of light on some amazing things here today. But firstly, would you mind explain about your journey so far and what has inspired you?
Speaker 2:yeah. So I had a really long journey leading up to this and and um, it kind of, I always say, like a windy, twisty road, like some people in life, they just know where they're going and they go right right there and, and in my life I think it was a lot of personal experiences that that kind of took me down these places. So my journey really started with me in my early 20s just completely abandoning my life in the fashion industry and moving out to the middle of nowhere and living in a log cabin without running water and just completely reconnecting to the earth. And just completely reconnecting to the earth, connecting to plants, connecting to my own spirituality, and from there the journey has just continued to progress and life has always put things in my path that have helped me to learn more about health, about nutrition, to meet people who were into different forms of spirituality. So I've had lots of different spiritual teachers in my life, from African priests that are Babalawos, to astrologers, to tarot readers, to shamans you name it.
Speaker 2:People have come into my life at random times and then left as quickly as they came in, but they left me with a big imprint of their teachings and then I've had some own health crises, with my children and with myself that have really deepened my understanding about natural health and how to help people to restore themselves, both spiritually and physically, because I truly believe, and have been shown time and time again in my clinical practice, that most of our diseases or, as I like to say, dis-eases, have an underlying spiritual cause behind them.
Speaker 2:And if we can identify those emotional or spiritual causes behind some people's dis-eases, it can help us, lead us closer to a path of restoration. And while herbal medicine and supplements and food and diet all really really help, but if we are holding on to some type of trauma deeply within ourselves, our body is also going to hold on to that disease or disease, because that is its way of getting it out of the body. And I really love what somebody had recently talked about, you know, a tumor being this actual growth that the body uses as a defense mechanism to surround something inside of the body, be it a toxin or a poison, and so the body essentially is encapsulating that poison so that it can't infest the entire system. And I've been working recently with a client of mine who has a tumor and we've been able to trace back their reasoning and their belief as to why that tumor happened in their body and unwinding some of those pathologies.
Speaker 1:And I think that's the most important work, as somebody who's working in the field of both spiritual health and physical health, is that we can help our clients find those pathways in both directions oh, I absolutely love what you were saying and the fact you love the nature kind of started the whole process, and I equally have a deep love of nature, so I really love hearing that and the fact that you want to treat the whole, the whole of a client, and not just the kind of symptoms but also like the cause. And I strongly believe as well that in the body, the body does things when it's holding some something that it kind of needs to let go off and it's getting to the root of that. And so I understand that you have pioneered your own herbal or herbal, as you say medicines and things. Could you talk a bit about that please?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so we're still deeply in research and development and working on expanding our product line. But it is a combination of my husband's work and my work, and so he spent half a decade researching into silicon, the forgotten macronutrient, and the importance of it in the body and working on the creation of what we call a silicon plasma hydrate. And so I'll start by explaining the plasma part of it, because this always kind of throws people off because they think of like plasmic technology. But I want to explain plasma as a state of water, and so most people are familiar with three phases of water solid, liquid and gaseous, right, like we're taught in school. But there's actually a fourth phase of water and that's a plasma. And this is the same state of water that the fluids in our own human body are. In the water in our body everyone knows we're like 65% plus water. But that water is not in a liquid state, it's in a gel-like state called a plasma. And it's really important because plasma conducts electrical, magnetic energy. It is actually think of it as like kind of like a telephone wire, right, it can send signals across that, because plasma is highly ionized, so it's charged particles. And I also tell people who's not into the science thing, like think about alkaline water. What is alkaline water? Alkaline water is highly ionized water, and so it's able to conduct electromagnetic energy.
Speaker 2:And this plasma is similar to the same stuff that our entire known universe is made up of. Science has shown that the universe is 99.9% plasma, that space is not empty, and this is important because in space it's filled with this plasma state of a fluid and it conducts electrical, magnetic energy. This is how the sun sends signals to the earth and are picked up by our poles. And so if we think about, the old axiom is that we are a microcosm of the macrocosm. This is one of those reflections in the human being is that inside of our bodies are these plasmas that mimic the universe.
Speaker 2:And so what's really really important about this silicon plasma is that one we're mimicking the state of the fluids in our bodies and the state of the known universe, and in that we're providing this forgotten macronutrient, silicon, which is responsible for the formation of our bones, our cartilage, our elastin and the tissues in our body. Without proper amounts of silicon in the body, our body is unable to repair these damages. And so if we think about, like, from heart health, what is our heart, it's this elastin, it's all of this cartilage and this tissue, and so that's like the first part of our research in what is like setting our herbal products apart from every other herbal product on the market is one, instead of having a base of, like a base oil or an alcohol base, our base is in this silicon plasma hydrate that we infuse our herbal ingredients into, and so I'll leave it there and we can talk about more about it after. Yeah, oh, wow it's.
Speaker 1:It's really interesting to hear and learn all about this and, yeah, wow, so it's kind of I I guess it's going to make it go into the body easier because it's mimicking something within the body. I'm not very scientific person, but that's that was my perception when you speaking to us. So why is like silicon the forgotten um nutrient and and how can we access it more?
Speaker 2:yeah, and so silicon plays a very fascinating role in our environment as well, and, and I think it's becoming more and more popular as a supplement, as people are becoming aware. So I'll say, like, one thing most people are aware of what are called blue zones around the world, and there's a lot of research into these blue zones, because people are living longer and healthier lives in these blue zones, and so there is one connection that they find across all of these blue zones and that is that their water is rich in silicon Super, super rich sources of silicon and that is because it's helping to maintain the strength of all of those body connective tissues and their bones and their heart, particularly with their heart health. And so it's just, it's not something that we think of when we think of, like, our vitamins. We think of vitamin A, d, e, k, all of these things that we're so accustomed to, and rarely are we taught about the importance of silicon. But even in our environmental structure, like silicon is really important. So I'm going to kind of mix two words because I'll use them simultaneously the word silicon and the word silica. So most people are familiar with silica as either as sand or as quartz crystal, and it's very important in those two states.
Speaker 2:So silicon is the precursor in nature to the building of silica, so that's the base element that goes into the creation of those crystalline formations. And so silica plays this huge role in the entire life of our system. In fact it even plays a role in carbon sequestration from the atmosphere. So all formations of rock contain some amount of silica in them, and in varying degrees. And what happens when these rocks are exposed to the air and they get rain and they're weathered, is this silica is released from the rocks and actually forms a bond with the carbon atoms in the air and it pulls them down and they're moved away in the waterways. And this is really important because this silica then feeds marine life. So a lot of people who are into natural gardening are familiar with diatomaceous earth. Diatomaceous earth comes from a sea creature that is one of the only life forms on earth that is not a carbon-based life form. It is a silica based life form. The diatomaceous earth creates its entire body structure out of silica, and it creates this structure out of the silica that is weathered from the rocks that has sequestered this carbon and pulled it into waterways, and so it's an absolutely fascinating cycle that, as people become more aware of the intense nature of silica or silicon, in our environment and that's just one of them it's essential nutrient for plants. Without silica in our soil, plants will be weak and susceptible to disease and breakage.
Speaker 2:And so if we think about how important this is in our world, we need to think about how important it is for us as well, and so by creating these herbal products that use this advanced delivery system of the silicon plasma hydrate, we're able to not just restore these systems, like our cartilage and our elastin, but we're also helping to restore the magnetic reconnection of the body, because our body is essentially just this large battery. Right, we're generating energy and we're sending signals over what most people believe. We're sending signals over our nervous system. But if you actually look at the human body, there's all these gaps in the system. They're not completely connected from end to end, right, and we're filled with this fluid and these spaces. Even if you look at diagrams in a medical journal and it'll show you the gaps in the synapses and they say that these nerves are sending signals to the other nerve end, right, and they kind of meet like this Well, what is it that is carrying that nerve system across the gap. Well, it's these plasma fluids in the body, and so it's extremely vital.
Speaker 2:And so when people have conditions like, say, we've been doing a lot of research with people who have had amputations, and one of the issues with people who have had amputations and one of the issues with people who have had an amputation is they get what's called phantom pains, and there is no pharmaceutical drug on earth that can get rid of their phantom pains. And this is where the body is sending a signal to say, the foot that is no longer there, and these people will be plagued with, say, an itch that they cannot itch. And so people will be plagued with an itch that they cannot itch. And so if you imagine, sometimes you have an itch and you want to itch it so bad, but you can't. And then it becomes absolutely maddening that you're unable to itch something. Imagine having a limb, that you have the sensation of having an itch or even a severe pain, and you're unable to calm it. And so in our preliminary trials, we have been able to stop people's phantom pains in as little as two to three minutes.
Speaker 2:Wow that's amazing. These topicals are helping to restructure those signals of the brain to that missing limb and then the brain can recognize that that limb is no longer there and so it stops sending the signals wow, I didn't even.
Speaker 1:I didn't, I didn't even realize that people had these phantom pains and when they had an amputation. That's really sad to hear. But it's amazing that your product are two minutes. That's like wow, that's kind of next level brilliance absolutely brilliant so that the the silicon? Um, why do you think we have, then, a shortage of it? Is it just we've always had a shortage of it, or do you think it's modern diet or a lot of environmental factors?
Speaker 2:yeah, so I don't think there is actually okay. So there's a couple reasons why we are having a shortage of its intake because there's no shortage of it out there in our environment yeah, huge amounts of it out in the environment. One, it's not in a water soluble form, so it can be challenging to uptake into the body. Then, two, most of us are drinking processed tap water. So if you're not drinking tap water from a rich source coming straight from the earth and it's been processed, you're losing out on all of those nutrients and minerals that are available from that water source. And so this is one of the things that, when we are making our silica and plasma hydrate, we have to use water in the creation of the process that turns this non-water soluble element into a water soluble element that can be taken into the body.
Speaker 2:We get our water from an ancient artesian well that is 1500 years old and we are drawing it straight out of the earth.
Speaker 2:So we are starting from the onset with this pure, beautiful, structured water that has all of the minerals that we need, and then we're taking that and, through our processes that we do in our laboratory, we are able to convert the silicon into a water-soluble form, and then it is put into a drinkable form.
Speaker 2:So you're not just getting the silica, but you're also getting the beautiful benefit of this ancient artesian well water. And so that's the number one reason, because we should be getting most of our silicon from our water sources, but we're no longer tapping our water from the earth. And then, number two, our food sources are so depleted in silicon because of our farming methods, which everyone's aware of the pesticides and the herbicides, and then the monocropping, and so you just have this continuous depletion from the system. And so we even are working on agricultural products that can be applied agriculturally so that it is replenishing the silica that is in the soil, so then the plants uptake it and then we ingest it in our plants too. So there's so many different ways that we can enhance our nutrient-rich diet by kind of returning back to the way that we were before we had this pharmaceutical agricultural world that we live in.
Speaker 1:Oh, absolutely. And I see a point about the water, not not from like scientific point of view, but just because when I'm in the countryside we've got walking distance to old wells and we can just collect like spring water and everyone locally goes and collects this water. And the days when I haven't had that and I've just had water through the filter, it just feels so kind of dead to say that it has no life the water. And when I'm in the city I have to then really filter, filter the water and also the the way people grow their food. When I grow my own food it feels so much more alive than the food I kind of buy from the supermarket. So I think, without take even without silicon into consideration, I can see how, how our modern ways of living is kind of really affecting our, our health and stuff. So how do your products? Um, so if I'm a listener and I'm somewhere international, am I able to easily access your products? Bonnie is, uh, can I do you deliver internationally?
Speaker 2:yeah, we do. We do deliver internationally. So I know you're in the UK and so we do deliver to the UK. We deliver to Australia and a number of other countries. There are some regulations in some countries, but as long as you're not in, like Iran or Iraq, um that that prohibit the the shipping of certain products. But our, our products are classified as as cosmetics or beauty products because they're not ingested orally, which allows us to be able to ship internationally with less restrictions, which is really beautiful because they're topical products. I have one here on my desk.
Speaker 2:Yeah so they come in a topical, and here in the US, because it's not taken internally, it's considered a cosmetic product, and so that's the beautiful thing about it is we're able to get it into the hands. As far as our oral silica that we offer, of course we can't ship that to a lot of countries because that's considered a supplement, but we do work with a professor in Switzerland who was one of the original researchers. He's actually a plasma physicist and so he's one of the original researchers that we have worked with to develop our product, and so there are branches of our products that are made in different countries so that it is accessible in the US I mean in the UK and so if you're interested in our oral silica, you can send me an email through our website and we can help to connect you with where it's being produced in areas that you would be able to purchase it outside of the US.
Speaker 1:Oh, perfect that's. That's great, because it's great that you can reach so many people. So how did you test your products and develop them? So how?
Speaker 2:did you test your products and develop them? So, like I said, we work with a professor in Switzerland, and so he's a plasma physicist and biologist and a teacher at the University of Madrid, and so he was the one who originally created the original silica that we work with and we use. And then, as far as our topicals go, because we took his original silica and created into a topical formula, so we have a patent pending formula that creates an amphiphilic bond between water and oil. And this is where our topicals get any even deeper into helping to restore the body, because the body's cells function off of lipids. And there's this whole move in the world like to reduce fats and to lose weight. But that's actually wrong, because our body's cells need one thing they need fats. Our cells are lipid creatures, and so if you reduce your fat intake, you actually harm the cells of your body and so you can create cellular damage. And so what we've done is we've taken our water-soluble silica and have an amphiphilic bond with an oil, and the oils in our products vary from product to product depending on what our end reasoning for the product is. And this is really important, because our body's cells have what's called a lipid bilayer. They have a water-loving side and an oil-loving side, and this is how the cells regulate what goes in and out of our cells. And what goes in and out of our cells are determined by what's called endocytic vesicles. And so you can think of these endocytic vesicles as essentially a vehicle like a car, and that car has to go through a checkpoint and that checkpoint says well, do you look like me, do you have a water tail and an oil tail, and can you come in and out and cross my gate? And so what we've done is we've mimicked that cellular structure of that oil and loving water tail and then we include herbal ingredients in our products that have a specialized focus on those endocytic vesicles so that they can enter into that vehicle, essentially like they have a key to the lock on that car and they can hop in that car and take a ride in and out of our cells, can hop in that car and take a ride in and out of our cells. And so this is what further makes them so effective is because we can just drive our products deeper and deeper into the body, and those carriers for those herbal product ingredients is really what makes the difference when we're taking, say, an herbal supplement or a tincture or a tea, we're ingesting that.
Speaker 2:And when we ingest an herb it has to go through our body's metabolic processes and be processed by the liver. And depending on the state and condition of a person's liver, their digestive system and their overall health is really greatly going to influence whether they're actually able to metabolize that herbal product and whether or not it's going to become systemic. They're actually able to metabolize that herbal product and whether or not it's going to become systemic, which means it goes through the entire body. And so by having an epidermal application, by applying through the skin, which is the largest organ of the body, we are able to bypass that metabolic process and have a higher entry rate of our herbal ingredients.
Speaker 2:And the other really important thing and here we're going to get a little bit more sciencey is there's something called a Dalton size, and the Dalton size refers to the size of a molecule. And so what we do with our products is we vary the Dalton size of some of our ingredients so that we're ensuring some of our ingredients stay on the surface of the skin to nourish. So say, if you have like a wound, because we have a wound care product, it's going to have a higher Dalton size because we want it to stay on the surface and nourish the skin, or we can have a lower Dalton size if we want it to be able to cross beyond that skin barrier and go deeper and penetrate into the body. And so that variation of the Dalton size of our ingredients is really vital to know if it's going to stay on the surface or how deep it's going to go into the body.
Speaker 1:Oh, it's absolutely fascinating. So it's basically like putting it in a particular car that's going to be able to drive to a different part of the body that's the way I envision that. Um, so you've got the phrase what ails you, what, what, how did that come about?
Speaker 2:yeah, so. So this is. This is kind of like that spiritual infusion into my work as well, and so the phrase what ails you comes from the story of Percival, and Percival was a knight of the round table, and I'm not going to explain the whole story, but I highly suggest reading. There's various versions of the story and there's a lot of meaning in there, but essentially Percival was invited into the Grail Castle by the Grail King and he enters into the Grail Castle and he is at this feast in which he sees all these magical wonders that are just expanding his mind, and he's sitting there and he really wants to ask the Grail King some questions. But along his path in life and on his prior journeys he had been criticized for asking too many questions and had been told time and time again that it is impolite to ask questions, especially when you arrive at a new location and are meeting new people.
Speaker 2:And so Percival is here at this feast with the Grail King and he can see that the Grail King is suffering and that the Grail King is in pain and he really wants to ask questions, but he does not ask any questions and he falls asleep at the Grail Castle and wakes up the next morning and is no longer there.
Speaker 2:And he wanders aimlessly, trying to find his way back to the Grail Castle, unable to find the castle again. And along these wanderings he realizes his mistake. And his mistake was that he failed to ask the grail king the question. And you go through the story wondering what the question is that he failed to ask the grail king. And it's not until all the way at the end that you're told that the question that he was supposed to ask the grail king was what ails you. And by asking the grail king the question what ails you, he would have set the grail king free from his suffering. And so the phrase what ails you is our way of asking people what is causing their suffering and what can we do to help you.
Speaker 1:I love all the story and how you came up with it. I could feel like this sense of warmth and, I don't know, inspiration from hearing you speak about that, bonnie. So thank you for that and and kind of using that as a compass for your your work is there something I always like to ask my guests? This is there something that you wish everybody knew in the world and if so, what is it?
Speaker 2:it's a really good question. If there was one thing I wish that everybody in the world could know is that you are a spark of the divine Within each and every one of you is a little bit of that spark of the divine, and if you can access your divine nature within yourself, it's limitless possibilities, absolutely limitless. And the true key to healing and the true key to restoration is to recognize where we have come from. I think we can get so bogged down in this material life that we're living that we fail to see what is really inside of ourselves and inside of every single one of us is a spirit, is a being who is here on earth having an experience because there were some lessons and some things that we needed to learn and that when this life is all over and said and done, that we get to return back to the spiritual world. And I think we get so clouded and bogged down by what religion tells us and the stories of hell and purgatory and all of these things, and they certainly have value and merit, because if we live a life here on this earth full of evil deeds and evil things, we're not going to be welcomed back into the spiritual world with open arms. But that last thing I said is really key that when we pass from this world, we are welcomed back into the spiritual world with open arms. There is something waiting on the other side. It's our cosmic mother and father, and I always like to emphasize this cosmic mother part.
Speaker 2:People have, through religion, have been taught that there is just this God, the Father.
Speaker 2:But if you really comb through the Bible with an open eye and an open mind, you will come across phrases again and again and again that will confirm that the Bible has told you that we created, who is the?
Speaker 2:We created man, who is this we, who is this other that is spoken about, and that is that cosmic mother that we came from, a cosmic mother and a cosmic father, and they are there on the other side waiting to welcome us back. And we're like children we can think of it as children, our kids. I'm a mom of four kids, and so I certainly know that they're all going to go out there in the world and they have their own lessons and their own trials and their own things that they're going to have to learn. And while I'm going to be here to support them, I have to let them fall down and get injured, otherwise they're really never going to learn how to walk on their own. If we pad them all around in every corner, they never learn anything. And our cosmic mother and father are the same way. They're here for us absolutely when we call upon them, but they also have to let us fall down from time to time, because that's how we learn absolutely.
Speaker 1:It's the only way that we can learn it. I remember my friend saying about um, you know how birds push the babies out of the nest and they kind of have to, like people think, oh, why would they do that? But it's the only way that they learn how to to fly fly by themselves. And I think that when we we do the stuff we're meant to do in this life, it inspires other people to see that they can do what they're meant to do as well. And um, bonnie, you're very knowledgeable on this and I I'm going to try your products. I think they sound fascinating. I'm sure they're very good for so, so many things. I'd be intrigued to know what are your future plans with all this?
Speaker 2:yeah, so we have.
Speaker 2:I have a number of products in the works, some that I'm really excited about um.
Speaker 2:So I'm currently working on a product, um for breast health, and so I've partnered with a doctor who does thermal imaging of breast as for breast cancer prevention and monitoring, and his one struggle is that, well, I can tell when somebody is at high risk for breast cancer and I can make dietary and lifestyle changes, but I don't have a a product that actually can reduce their risk.
Speaker 2:And so we are 90% through our research and development, and in the coming weeks here are going to have our product finalized and then it is going to go into the testing phase with our doctor to be tested on some of his patients just to check and ensure that the product does what it says it's going to do. And so one of my biggest future goals is in the creation of a topical that can help to reduce the risk of breast cancer, and this is largely done because on the thermal imaging, there's signs of heat and stagnation that is starting to build around the breast tissue, and so our topical focus is on dispersing and eliminating the heat around the tissue and then to help to improve the lymphatic flow so that we have the removal of the toxins around that breast tissue and our hope and our theory is that this is going to help to reduce the risk of breast cancer in some of these women.
Speaker 1:That would be an amazing thing to do. I've had family members who've had breast cancer so I know it's such an impactful situation on different people's lives and the fact that you could do development of product that's going to help with breast health is absolutely, astoundingly brilliant.
Speaker 2:And I would like to say is that if you know the kind of I call it the marriage between kind of mainstream um medicine and herbal medicine, I read somewhere that or saw somewhere that you think they can work together if they learn to Absolutely, and that's one of the biggest things that I really work with my clients who come into my clinic is that your MD, your doctor, needs to be our biggest ally because we need to work together, especially when people come into my office and they've been on pharmaceuticals and they're really looking to reduce that or eliminate the pharmaceuticals in their life and move to natural products. I cannot do that without the cooperation of your doctor. But there is also a lot of clinical studies and trials and evidence that show that herbal medicine can actually make pharmaceutical drugs more effective and less harmful to the body and that when they're used in conjunction with each other, they have significant benefits.
Speaker 2:And if we look at other countries like China, china has a huge, rich history of herbal medicine. Traditional Chinese medicine has a far larger materia medica than we have here in the United States. They have I think it's something like 600 different medicinal plants that are in their materia medica, versus just a few hundred here in the US that are grown. And because China did not have the money like we did in Western medical industry, they had to develop, for instance, cancer protocols through their herbal medicine treatments, and so in China they have a very beautiful marriage between herbal medicine and their chemotherapy and radiation treatments, which they use in conjunction with each other, and they have a lot of studies showing that when herbal medicine is used with cancer treatment, particularly chemotherapy for instance, people won't lose their hair, their hair does not fall out, that the herbs actually help to protect the rest of the body, and they have a lot of evidence showing that it is more effective at the same time and that they have less wasting syndrome cachexia, which is a common issue and is actually one of the leading causes of death in people who are going through these treatments, because they essentially waste away.
Speaker 2:Their digestive system becomes wrecked, they're no longer able to absorb nutrients from their food. They lose their appetite entirely. There's a whole long laundry list of things that people have to endure when they're going through these treatments, and so my future vision here in the US and in every country across the globe is that we would begin to integrate some of these protocols into our lives and into our medical systems. Here in the US, it is absolutely illegal for me to put somebody on an herbal protocol if they are going through any type of cancer treatment with an oncologist. It is illegal. I cannot, I cannot recommend it to them, I can't tell them about it, I can't do anything for them if they are being seen by an oncologist, and it's absolutely detrimental to the human being to restrict them from access to natural medicine that would help to not only make their treatment more effective, but would help to improve their quality of life simultaneously.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. That makes me sad to hear that they don't have access to that. I don't think it's the same. Here in the UK you're allowed to um, so it's sad to hear that. Do you think that's going to change at all? I hope.
Speaker 2:I hope that it's going to change. I think that it is something that people want and until people demand it. But the other thing is too is awareness People even knowing that these options exist? Even if you're in a country in which you are allowed to be taking these herbal medicines simultaneously with your cancer treatment, if you don't know that that option exists, how are you ever going to request it?
Speaker 1:So true, if you don't know, you're not going to know it exists and you're not going to be able to to have access to that. And some sometimes I think the western medicine what kind of wants to keep people so that they don't know about it. But I think, um, people like yourself, who who's kind of shining the lights light on it and I'm not saying that it's it's wrong to take other medicines, but it's more like finding a kind of way to be together and and a way to kind of make it flow in that way. So if I'm a listener and I want to either like contact you see about your website, stuff like that, could you please enlighten our listeners and how they can do that and what your website is? Thank you you.
Speaker 2:So I'll start by saying that I am a. I have a love for unique and unusual names for things, and a lot of my my names for my businesses are derived from ancient Greek words that I have altered to kind of fit my needs. So you can find me. One beautiful hub is bonniediercangelocom, and so that's my name, without the apostrophe, and on there you'll find links to every single one of my business my clinical practice, which is called Veusebia, and that comes from the ancient Greek word Eusebia, which means the sacred awe and reverence for something, and so I loved that word and I look at my clinical practice as a sacred awe and reverence for the plants and the medicine they provide for us. And then my topical product, my herbal product company, is etherbalcom, and that's spelled with an A-E, and you can find links to all of those on my website at bonnieanddarkangelocom, and you can also contact me through there with any questions you might have.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's really helpful, bonnie, and we're coming to the point. Now we're coming to the end of the interview, but I always think, because I'm the one asking the questions, is there something that you wish we had covered and you'd like to express at this point?
Speaker 2:I think we did a beautiful job talking about the topicals and touching on herbal medicine, and there's one thing that I always like to tell people about herbal medicine it's not a one size fit all. I hear it from a lot of women like oh, I tried black cohosh for my menopausal symptoms and it didn't work. It's not a blanket. Everybody is different and herbal medicine is largely based on energetics, which means like they have hot and cold properties to each herb. They can be drying or they can be moistening, and everybody's body is different.
Speaker 2:What you need and that one herb by itself is like a person standing alone in a desert. It's going to have a very hard time surviving. But when you have a properly formulated herbal set that includes four, five, even seven or 10 different herbs, they have a tendency to work better in a synergistic system and they can support each other for their own survival and they can support each other's work. You know we kind of have like this kind of tier that we do in herbal medicine. Like you have a chief herb that is for the main pattern, and then a deputy and an assistant and an envoy, and all of these people help to assist that chief, and so I really encourage people who are interested in using herbal medicine to seek out an herbalist who is well-trained and well-versed so they can help to create a formula that is tailor-fit for you.
Speaker 1:Oh, that sounds very wise advice, bonnie. Thank you, and I'm really honoured to have you on the show. It wasn't subject matter that I knew a lot about, but you've enlightened me on that. I'm definitely going to check out your website. Dear listeners, please stay tuned, as the meditation inspired by today's show. But thank you once again, bonnie D'Arcangelo, for joining us today from Michigan. Thank you, bonnie.
Speaker 2:Thank you, Jane, so much for having me. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 1:Top tips for the meditation is either sit nice and cross-legged on the floor with a nice straight back Always nice to sit on a block or a cushion. Although that's not available for you, you sit in a chair with the back nice and straight. The important thing is you're not slouching, and if you're doing something that requires your concentration, all you need to do is just pause this and you can reconvene the meditation at a time that is good for you. If you're doing the meditation, let's begin. So, without further ado, here's today's meditation, and I thought we would do a meditation inspired by water.
Speaker 1:So, dear listeners, as you close the eyes, imagine that you are surrounded by this floating pool of water in your imagination and you hear the bubbles of the water as it cascades gently, but sometimes a bit more quickly, past you. In this shallow but warm pool of water and this pool, you just sit by and just listen to the sounds. You listen to the moment. You connect to all the energy, all the information that the water, as much as the mind tries to go off into different places. Let thoughts be there, but just bring it back to this water and all you can do is you can continue breathing calmly and deeply for the next few minutes, listening to the water.
Speaker 1:Keep going, you're doing great and you're slowly now going to look into this imaginary pool of water and just ask yourself what reflection do I need to see to progress me further in my life? It can be anything a place, a face, a word, but just your personal journey. What do you see? And then you inhale, and you exhale slowly and softly through the nostrils. You come back into the moment, come back into the day, making a note of what it was that you saw in your mystical pool of water. So, as always, thank you for listening.
