Today we proceed futher along our shelves, looking at the herbs we keep in our home apothecary. In this episode we discuss goldenrod and wood betony.
When using the botanical Latin name for goldenrod, we write Solidago spp. – that “spp.” means “species plural”; there are many varieties in the genus. It can hard to tell them apart! Fortunately, your senses can tell you about the particular actions of your particular goldenrod. Is it more bitter? That’ll have more digestive action. Is it more aromatic? That’ll really get you kidneys moving. It’s also worth trying goldenrod leaf-only vs flower-only tea or tincture.
Betony, also called wood betony, is Stachys officinalis. It’s related to lamb’s ears (Stachys byzantina), but nowhere near as fuzzy, and with smaller, scallop-edged leaves. An herb with a panoply of benefits, in modern people we find its most important attributes are its grounding and centering effects. These can help us oppose the habits of multitasking and dissociation from the body which are so prevalent today. It’s also a very easy herb to grow in a pot on your portch!
Mentioned in this episode:
Taking a fallow period to focus on the hands-on aspects of herbalism is one of our favorite tips for people who are learning. There are lots of ways to study, and lots of ways to enhance your learning. We’ve collected our best suggestions into a FREE COURSE for you: Herbal Study Tips! 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, these are self-paced online video courses, which come 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!
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.
You can find all of our online herbalism courses at online.commonwealthherbs.com!
Today we proceed futher along our shelves, looking at the herbs we keep in our home apothecary. In this episode we discuss goldenrod and wood betony.
When using the botanical Latin name for goldenrod, we write Solidago spp. – that “spp.” means “species plural”; there are many varieties in the genus. It can hard to tell them apart! Fortunately, your senses can tell you about the particular actions of your particular goldenrod. Is it more bitter? That’ll have more digestive action. Is it more aromatic? That’ll really get you kidneys moving. It’s also worth trying goldenrod leaf-only vs flower-only tea or tincture.
Betony, also called wood betony, is Stachys officinalis. It’s related to lamb’s ears (Stachys byzantina), but nowhere near as fuzzy, and with smaller, scallop-edged leaves. An herb with a panoply of benefits, in modern people we find its most important attributes are its grounding and centering effects. These can help us oppose the habits of multitasking and dissociation from the body which are so prevalent today. It’s also a very easy herb to grow in a pot on your portch!
Mentioned in this episode:
Taking a fallow period to focus on the hands-on aspects of herbalism is one of our favorite tips for people who are learning. There are lots of ways to study, and lots of ways to enhance your learning. We’ve collected our best suggestions into a FREE COURSE for you: Herbal Study Tips! 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, these are self-paced online video courses, which come 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!
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.
You can find all of our online herbalism courses at online.commonwealthherbs.com!
<silence>
Speaker 2:Hi, I'm Katya .
Speaker 3:I'm Ryn ,
Speaker 2:And we're here at Commonwealth Holistic Urbanism in Boston, Massachusetts,
Speaker 3:And on the internet everywhere. Thanks to the power of the podcast.
Speaker 2:Woo .
Speaker 3:Well, today our , um, our travel through our shelves of herbs has led us to so and statues , also known as Golden Rod and Bettany . And this time we can look out of our window and we can see those plants blooming. Yeah. That doesn't ,
Speaker 2:That's kind of
Speaker 3:Amazing. That hasn't always happened in this series, but it's really nice. Yeah,
Speaker 2:Yeah , yeah. Um, would Beany has this like, really brilliant purpley pink kind of , um, like cotton candy tt of flowers at the top. And of course, golden Rod has this bright spray of like deep yellow , uh, flowers. And so they, they, it's funny 'cause they kinda look like the colors that are commonly associated with the holiday Easter <laugh> , but <laugh> , but it's like not the right time of year for that. Like, they're kind of , you know, pink and yellow are kind of springy sorts of colors. And this is like late season color. But , um mm-hmm . <affirmative> , it's just so beautiful.
Speaker 3:Yeah. I'm probably gonna keep glancing over there through the window today. <laugh> , that particular golden rod is like really sun saturated and Yeah. Gorgeous. And Yeah. Draws the eye, you know, so <laugh> . So yeah. Those are gonna be our two plants today. Uh , before we jump into that, we just wanna remind you all that our podcast is only one of the things we do, <laugh> . We're , we're primarily teachers and we have an online herb school. Well,
Speaker 2:I mean, we teach on the podcast too,
Speaker 3:Right ?
Speaker 2:<laugh> . But, but we want you to get to know us this way before you enroll in our schools so that you know for sure that our school is the place where you wanna be. There are a lot of herb schools out there. They are not the same. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> , everybody develops their own curriculum. Different schools do not teach the same things. And so there's no real way for you to find the school that's right for you without trying some stuff. So that's why we put so much stuff into this podcast, is that you get a feel for how we teach and the sorts of things that are important to us and the types of things that we emphasize and the way that we work.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah. And if you're, you know, watching this on YouTube at the moment , um, our video courses are kind of similar, <laugh> . Uh , we like to be in the room with you in a way, <laugh> . Yeah . And we like to, to talk right to you and share our stories and tell you our experiences with herbs and, you know, share some research and <laugh> , <laugh> and other things along the way.
Speaker 2:Of course. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Um, but our , our courses are all centered on video lessons. And every lesson also has an integrated discussion thread built right in. So as you're watching along, you can hit pause, type in a question, start your video up again, and sometime in the next 24 hours you're gonna get a response. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> straight back to you.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And if you are not watching this as a video on YouTube, but you are listening to it like old school podcast style , um, then don't worry because every video has a corresponding MP three file. So you can take us with you in your ears and study that way if that is a better form of learning for you than like sitting and watching.
Speaker 3:Yeah. It's often nice to like, take a walk, put on an herb lecture. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> , kinda let it soak in as you're looking at trees through space that can help with, with , uh, like the knowledge I'm printing. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Or even do it both ways. Like watch the video when you have some quiet time and you're gonna take notes, but then take the MP three with you and like listen to it while you're doing garden chores or whatever else as like a review. Yeah . Um , way of doing it. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah. And with our school, you've got time for that because your course access doesn't expire. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, you know, you're not like on, okay, I've got six weeks to cram all this information in and then I won't have it anymore. We're not gonna do that. You , you get your course, you get it forever. And when we add new stuff later, you get that too. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Yeah .
Speaker 2:Yeah. We really want you to learn. And the way to learn is to review and then come back a couple years later and review it again. And we don't think you should have to pay again, just to like, review material that we really want you to have. And then if we create updates, we , we figure you are gonna need that too. So we just put it all in there for free. Once you buy it, it's just yours forever. All the updates are yours. Everything.
Speaker 3:Yeah. And there's more, you know, we, we could go on for a long time, but you get access to q and a with us twice a week. Uh, there's a community , um, which is sort of like social media, but way, way better. 'cause it's all irby people who are just there to talk about plants and enjoy them together.
Speaker 2:And it's privately hosted on our own website. Right . It's not like a private Facebook group or something. Yeah . No, no, no. It is like a completely private social media entity of its own. Except it's just herbal media. That's it. It's really, it's really awesome social
Speaker 3:Herbalism. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2:<laugh> .
Speaker 3:Um, so you can find all of our courses and all of our other complex programs and everything available@online.commonwealthherbs.com.
Speaker 2:Yes. Whether you are starting at the very, very beginning or whether you've been doing this for a long time and you are ready to professionalize or any point in the middle , uh, we've got stuff for you. So come check it out. Yeah. Support the podcast. Enroll in Herb school with us <laugh> . There we go.
Speaker 3:Yeah. That's the best way. That's the best way for sure. All right . So here comes the reclaimer. That's where we, we remind everybody that we're not doctors, we're herbalist and holistic health educators.
Speaker 2: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. Only
Speaker 3:We wanna 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 here, we're not attempting to present a single dogmatic right way that you should adhere to. 'cause we don't believe there is such a thing. Mm .
Speaker 2: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. Farther
Speaker 3:Finding your way to better health is both your rights and your own personal responsibility. This doesn't mean you're alone on this journey. Right. But it, 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 by friendly herbalists on the internet, or prescribed by a physician, that's always your choice to make
Speaker 2:You have that power. Sometimes it doesn't feel like it, but that's actually, that's the purpose of all the education, is that you can't just like randomly make a choice if you don't know what the options are. Um, but, but if you know, then it's easier for you to feel like you're driving the bus of your own health. <laugh>.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. All right . So let's start off with goldenrod. So , yeah. This one. When, when you, when you write the name of your plant and , uh, you're writing a little herbal article or whatever you, you wanna put both names, right? You wanna give the common name and you wanna give the botanical name. And for Goldenrod, what we do is we write, so , s p p dot , and that means species, plural. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> , because with goldenrod there are, there are a lot of species and some of them are really hard to tell apart from each other . Mm-hmm . <affirmative> . But the nice thing is that as far as your herbalism is concerned, I don't wanna say it doesn't matter, but you are gonna be able to tell the qualities of your particular golden rod by your senses. Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:<affirmative>. Yeah . All of the golden rods have medicinal efficacy, but over time you will develop favorites. The , the one thing about golden rod is that it is not super easy to purchase. This is a plant that you kind of do need to harvest yourself. There are sometimes you can purchase it at, like, I think healing spirits farm in New York is the only one I've ever seen grow it. But that , that's probably changing
Speaker 3:Sometimes shop have it and it's mostly leaf, which ,
Speaker 2:Well, that's the other thing, which
Speaker 3:Is okay . Which is fine. Yeah. It's very
Speaker 2:Like
Speaker 3:The leaf is , the leaf is actionable. The , all the aerial parts of the plant are what we work with. Right. Aerial parts is everything above the soil. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Yeah .
Speaker 2:The actions of the leaves and the actions of the flowers are not the same. But that is kind of the same thing about how it varies a little bit from species to species. It's because different phytochemicals are concentrated in different amounts in the leaves versus in the flowers. Um, and so depending on what kind of work you're trying to do, you might want the leaves or you might want the flowers. And also, depending on the kind of work you are trying to do, you might want one plant over another. And today we're drinking, the tea that we have is , um, a lymphatic base blend that I've been drinking a lot of lately. Self-heal and cholan and red clover. And then there's wood beany and golden rod in here to like, keep it on theme. And , um, the golden rod that I have right now that I harvested last year , um, is not actually my favorite. And I'm gonna tell this story because I want you to , um, I want you to know what it kind of feels like to go out and harvest it yourself. That's sometimes intimidating for people to do the first time. Um, so I just, I kind of want you to have a little feel for how that goes.
Speaker 3:Yeah . Golden Rod is a , a great herb to get started with though, in terms of wildcrafting for like many reasons. One is that it's easy to find <laugh>. Yeah. It's, it's easy to identify. It's not gonna have like deadly lookalikes <laugh> mm-hmm . <affirmative> in whatever region you may be. Um, you can harvest without harming the organism. Right. You can just clip off, you know, six or eight inches of flowers off of the top bit of leaf along with that and leave the rest growing No problem. But also, you're not gonna over harvest golden rod <laugh> . Right . There's so much of it everywhere. Right. It's a weeded. Yeah. Right . So, so for all these reasons, it's an an excellent choice.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So when you're harvesting, just always make sure that you don't take all of the flowers from any given plant. Like leave half the flowers on the plant and, or more than half. If that is the right thing to do there,
Speaker 3:Your local bees will thank you. The
Speaker 2:Bees will thank you. But also that means that tho the rest of the flowers that you leave behind can reproduce and make seeds and, and , um, be next year's golden rod . And again, I'm like all the usual caveats with wild harvesting. Um, and we did a whole episode about that and probably even remembers the number. Ooh . Uh ,
Speaker 3:It's in there somewhere, <laugh>,
Speaker 2:But , um, it'll, there will be a link in the show notes. 'cause he always is really good about putting those in. Um, and so definitely, like, I , I think that even if you've listened to that episode about Wildcrafting, listen to it again, because it is really important , um, that we are much more careful about wildcrafting than , um, than is usually taught. And even in the community today, somebody was mentioning that they saw their first ever ghost pipe and of , and they had no intention of harvesting it, and they just were so grateful to see it. Um, you know, because knowing that that plant is so endangered. And then she mentioned that on TikTok , she sees everybody talking about it and talking about working with it. And nobody is mentioning that that plant is very, extremely at risk or endangered depending on where you are located. And she was so distraught that it's a , it's a plant with, with such precarity and that people are just out , um, you know, kind of willy-nilly talking about it. So
Speaker 3:Grabbing it by the buckets, you know?
Speaker 2:Yeah. Please don't. Yeah . Um , so a good reason not to learn herbalism from TikTok, I guess <laugh> , but , um, anyway, so, so, okay. But, but Golden Rod is a good place to start because it is an extremely abundant plant and it reproduces very easily. So those things are really great. But, okay. So I wanna talk about this batch of Golden Rod that I have right now. Um, first off, I drastically prefer the flowers for golden rod over the leaves. The flowers have a lot more of the aromatic, aromatic actions . So that's the volatile oil content. Um, and that is going to, like, change the focus of the work that the plant is doing, whereas the leaves really concentrate the bitter aspects. So you're still gonna get kidney support from the leaves for absolutely sure. But you're also gonna get a lot more digestive action from that bitterness.
Speaker 3:Right. Gar , golden rod is kind of famous as a, as a diuretic, as a anti-inflammatory for the kidneys as a nerve that can be helpful for the urinary system kind of broadly as a result of those impacts. Um, but yeah, sometimes you take your golden rod and you're like, this is a digestive bitter <laugh> . Like , this is gonna get my flowing . Yeah . This is great. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 2:Yeah. Yeah . Um, and then in the, in the flowers, there's more of the volatile oil content. There's more of the like , um, urinary antiseptic action. Um, there's, you know, still that kidney support, but a little more on the antiseptic side, a little more on the, like u t i fighting side of things, and also more of the vulnerary action. Uh, so , uh, the word means to make whole, and it, it has very potent vulnerary , um, effects. And so if you are thinking about like, epithelial damage because of, like, in the GI tract, because you were eating a bunch of food allergies, or because you recently had covid or all the different reasons , um, then there's
Speaker 3:Plenty of reasons. <laugh>, there's
Speaker 2:So many reasons, right. Then this would be a , a really good choice there. But I prefer to focus on the flowers for that. Okay, great. The flowers, they're less , less bitter, more aromatic. But here's the thing , from species to species, they also vary. And so last year I was , um, a little nervi we were gonna be moving, and I knew that, that that was gonna make it hard for me to harvest , um, some things. And I had this stand of goldenrod that was a very early blooming stand. It was blooming like full bloom in June. And I thought, wow, I better harvest this now. And I never do that. I always harvest very, very late in the summer. Um, because I don't know, because I just always do Right. Spin the habit. Yeah . Yeah. The species that I normally have access to blooms very late in the summer. Um, but this other one that I saw was blooming in June and I , and it was, it looked beautiful. It was super abundant. There was tons and tons of it. It was in an area that was gonna be mowed anyway, so I was like, this is perfect. This is the perfect place to, to gather. And I gathered it, and it's very effective and very bitter. Yeah . Um, all the volatiles are there , but super bitter. And I also feel like it has a much higher saponin content than , um, late season , uh, golden rod . I,
Speaker 3:I, you're getting some bubbles in your , more bubbles in your tea when you <laugh> . Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:More so Sapp , so sapin are kind of what they sound like, right? They're , they're soap like behavior inside of your, your infusions and stuff. So if you have a nerve with some sepinin content and you put it in water and then shake it up a bit, you'll see the bubbles form there. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> . Yeah .
Speaker 2:So I Golden
Speaker 3:Round doesn't usually have a lot. We're not saying it's like, you know, jalon <laugh> , something like that. Right. But there's some in there. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And definitely enough to bubble up and , um, you know, make it kind of a little foamy like beer, when you very first pour it , um, especially if you're pouring it from something under pressure. Like we, we usually are making it in one of those vacuum AirPods. Um, and, and so it kind of like vacuums it up the little straw and spits it out. The , the spout and the spout is kind of small, so that puts it under a little bit of pressure and makes it a little bubblier. But we've been using that for years and years , and this batch is bubblier than previous batches. So, okay, that's fine. That's all, that's all of that is information about the phytochemical content of this particular species of golden rod . And , um, I, I like it quite a bit, but, but it is bitter. And so if you're out, like, normally when I talk about golden mod flowers , I talk about them being sweet, like honey and so delicious, like all this stuff. And if you go out and you just get the leaves , uh, you'll be like, wow, Katya , this is not delicious. <laugh> . Like, what are you thinking? But also, if you go out and harvest some other species, that is not the species that I normally harvest it late in the summer, you might also feel like, I don't know what Katya thinks is sweet and delicious, but it's not this. Um, and, and that's okay. That is the plant, the different species of the plant showing you the variation of its phytochemical makeup, which is actually amazing if you think of it. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah. And it's kind of cool. And sometimes it's not like they're , they're all growing in clusters. Like you might find , uh, several of them mixed together. I often see this along the Charles River mm-hmm. <affirmative> , um, when I do our walks there in bo in Boston, and you'll find like the, like the grass leaves sal , and you'll find the ones that are kind of more like the kind of densest or the kinds we see frequently. Um, but, but yeah, they can be right next to each other. And it's good then to, to say like, all right, well, I'm gonna sample a little li flour and I'm gonna sample a little la flour and see how they compare and, you know, have a mix or pick the one you like best. You know, do what you do. But , um, but it is good to work with your senses in that way to, to say, all right , well, you're golden rod, but what kind of golden rod are you
Speaker 2:<laugh> ? Yeah. Which , yeah, exactly. So the, the Canadas is the one that I like best. Um, but there are so many , and sometimes you can't idea all the way because there are so many species and you could say, well, this is either this one or that one, but they look so close to each other that it's hard to tell. Right . Um , but none of them are poisonous. So , um, none of them have any toxicity. They all have medicinal action. Uh, so that's really good. Mm-hmm .
Speaker 3:<affirmative> . Yeah. Okay. Uh, with goldenrod, one thing that we often observe is that it's not just about, you know, phys physical activity in your kidney and that kind of thing. That's, that's critical. That's important, right. But it's not the only thing, golden Rod is one of these plants that we say is like an honorary nervine . Mm-hmm. <affirmative> , <laugh> <laugh> , because it doesn't, it's not, it doesn't seem to be like directly impacting nerve states in a, in a very noticeable way, the way say Beany does. And we'll , we'll talk about that here, but , um, but goldenrod, it's more like, okay, I'm feeling a little less bogged down. I'm feeling a little better able to, to keep on moving. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2:I'm pretty excited to be talking about Gold Knot today, because today is a very bogged down day for me. I just mm-hmm . <affirmative> , my whole body feels just like, like I'm moving through molasses and , um,
Speaker 3:Some fluid heaviness with the heat and the humidity we've had.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Yeah. And so I'm just really, and, and, you know, okay, a little too much information here, menstruation, it's not super fun. But, but if you get like that when you're menstruating, if you get like, heavy and boggy, especially in perimenopause , um, I mean, especially anytime actually, but perimenopause is relevant to me, so right now I'm kinda where you're Yeah . <laugh> .
Speaker 3:Yeah . No, but this one has always been something you, you want to include when you're like, I've got a lot of fluid heaviness down in my, down in my pelvic <laugh> .
Speaker 2:Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Um, there's just a lot of movement in golden rod , and very specifically there is movement through heaviness. And so when I'm working with Golden Rod as a nerving , having nothing to do with whatever else is going through my body physiologically. But really just thinking about it in terms as of emotional health, it's always like we <laugh> we always use the word to trudge , like when you are just trudging through <laugh>, like, like just the same mock again, and it's miserable and terrible, and you just have to keep going. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> , uh, then Golden rod is like the, such , just such an uplifting herb for one . You're having those kinds of emotions. You may not actually be trudging through anything, but, but emotionally, that's how you feel. Check it
Speaker 3:Out. Yeah . Sogo more like soldier on Go
Speaker 2:<laugh>. That is what it's like <laugh> . Yeah. That is what it's like. That is what it's like. Yeah . You know, it has a , but it's ,
Speaker 3:That's not, it's not a, it's not a nervous system stimulant. We're not talking about caffeine. Mm-hmm . Right . If anything, it is a stimulant, but it's like a fluid movement stimulant in the body. And again, come back to that kidney activity, right? Mm-hmm. <affirmative> , drain the excess wastes, keep the inner waters clean and beautiful and flowing and all of that, right? Mm-hmm . <affirmative> mm-hmm . <affirmative> , that's, that's the kinda stimulation that this brings. But sometimes that can, that can reach your mind, that can reach your emotions. You know, we don't find that surprising as herbalist. That's sort of baked into the, into the art. But , um, a lot of times trying to ex explain that to somebody, like, no, I , I understand that you're tired, but I don't want to give you straight up stimulant herbs. I don't think rodeo is the right choice. <laugh> , you know, that kind of thing. Yeah, yeah ,
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah . What do we need to stimulate what needs to move in the body? Mm-hmm . <affirmative> . Yeah. Find that and you'll be in a good spot.
Speaker 2:Yeah. I just, I just think about , um, Ukraine actually, because also it has that, that beautiful golden yellow color, like the Ukrainian flag.
Speaker 3:Really? Yeah. It's ,
Speaker 2:It's that yellow. Yeah. And if you think about like, you know, the gift you wanna give to Ukraine right now, it is the gift of like, just keep going. Just, just, just keep going. You can do it. And that's, that's when you're feeling like, like that, that's, that's golden rod . That's golden
Speaker 3:Rod . Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Well, let's turn to Beany then. Let's talk about statues . Statues . Offic, also known as statues . Botanica also known as Botanica . Fics . <laugh>, depending on how far back you look into your herbal shelf. Yeah.
Speaker 2:<laugh> and statues , if we just say often we do just say statues . Um,
Speaker 3:I guess you could say Staes if you want to.
Speaker 2:Yeah , you probably could. Or yeah,
Speaker 3:We could do like, like a really German one, like stop
Speaker 2:Stalks . But that would be wrong. It wouldn't , it wouldn't , it wouldn't be right. It wouldn't
Speaker 3:Be German. Yeah. No ,
Speaker 2:No, it wouldn't be. Right. Um, uh, so when we like talk to each other about statues , it's always wood beney , but it's important to recognize that there are a bunch of other statues, family plants, right. That you might see in a garden. They're very common, actually. One is lambs ears , and then there's another one
Speaker 3:That is Byzantium . Yeah . Like lambs ears .
Speaker 2:Yeah. Oh my goodness. It's , and
Speaker 3:It's, it's so fuzzy. It's
Speaker 2:Great. It's called Lambs ears . And Yes, but it's , it , I was just that , um, uh, very lovely woman named Emmy, works with us. If you've ever emailed us, you might have Emmy might have replied. Um, thanks Emmy , or , yes, thank you so much. Emmy and Emmy also helps us answer the discussion threads. And so I was at her garden , um, last week, and she was giving me lots of blue vering and bone set and other wonderful things. And I was very excited about it. But she had a lot of lambs ears , you know, just 'cause it's an amazing plant. And it had just rained and they looked like, you know, a cat's tongue and it, the , they looked like that they really,
Speaker 3:Because it was covered with the little water.
Speaker 2:Yeah. The , the little water. Yeah, exactly. So anyway, it's just, it's, it's an amazing plant and, and also has medicinal tradition as well. Um, but here we are talking about the, it's gut kind of delicate leaves, sort of the same, like nettle or dandelion, you know, like leaves, you can tear pretty easily. Lambs year , you can't tear those leaves very easily.
Speaker 3:<laugh> , there's a tiny bit of fuz on, on beany , but not, not anything like lambs.
Speaker 2:No, nothing like that. And it's, the leaves are very scallop, like, like a , um, valentine decoration, <laugh>, you know, something like that. Like very, very scallop
Speaker 3:On the edges.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And then there's just this cut . It's a very, the leaves are at the bottom. There's a very tall stock with a , maybe a couple of tiny leaves, and then this like tought of cotton candy at the top that are the flowers. Um, so that's the one. And it's tall. It's like, you know, taller than knee high . Um, and I'm six feet tall, so that's like, might be taller than thigh high for some people. Um , some people, but <laugh> . Um, but yeah, it's, it's just a brilliant, wonderful, beautiful plant. Uh, yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah. It's really lovely to have, have , uh, have a beany with you and you can grow it in a pot on your porch. It's gonna handle that easy. It's in the mint family, so it's pretty resilient. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> , um, in terms of conditions and sun exposure. And did I forget to water you, you know, and stuff like that? Yeah. <laugh> . Um, be kind to your baty please. But you know, it can, it can hang. Yeah. We, for many years, there was a , an in-person herbal conference in Boston called Herb Stock . And we would go and we would set up a table and talk to people about our school and present classes and everything. And from the very first year, we made a habit of bringing a, a live beany plant in a pot and having it there with us. And, you know, you do the, you do the conference and you have to talk to, you get to <laugh> talk to, you can tell my introvert is there, right . You, you get to talk to a few hundred people in , in a day. And , uh, or
Speaker 2:Even, like, they would have a thousand people come through. Yeah. But, you know, everybody would go to class for like an hour, and then there would be like 20 minutes to like walk around and Right . See all the things. And so there'd be like, like a thousand people, just like all
Speaker 3:At once. They come in these waves <laugh> . Yeah . Right. And it's like, and it's very intense. Oh , okay. There's lots of buzzing in the air, and like, oh , energy's really up. And we , we , both of us would notice, we're like, subconsciously we would wander next to the betan knee as we're talking to somebody and start like petting it <laugh> . It's kind of like stroking the flowers and , or leaves and sniffing the flowers and being like, okay, this, this Serb is calling me for that, for that groundedness. <laugh> , yeah . That beany can offer. Yeah. Yeah. That's sort of, it's, it's key thing. Most people when they talk about beany , they're gonna go right to that. Like, oh, it , it grounds you mentally. And you'll hear discussions of like, okay, there's some digestive activity, a little, little slight bitterness, you know, some wound healing in the gut, some movement in there , uh, some fluid, fluid movement down in the, down in the abdomen and everything. But the, the effects on your mind and your brain and your head generally mm-hmm . <affirmative> are they really stand out, especially in modern populations.
Speaker 2:Yeah. You know, it , it , I feel like beany is the antidote to multitasking. You know, like, well , humans don't multitask very well, and it's so bad because on one hand we don't multitask well, but we are pushed to do it constantly. And so we try, but then when you try to stop multitasking after you've been doing it for a long time, you like, you get withdrawal from multitasking. And so both, like, it's uncomfortable to try to multitask, you know, like trying to talk to somebody and type something and scroll in your phone all at the same, like, you can't, you can't do all that, but we all try to do it. And , um,
Speaker 3:Yeah. What you're really doing is task switching , uh, like on a, on a short schedule, you're like, micro , I'm doing this now, I'm doing this now I'm doing this now. It sort of works, but it , it's, it's not ideal, especially for certain kinds of work, right? Mm-hmm. <affirmative> like writing an emotionally charged email to a friend
Speaker 2:<laugh>
Speaker 3:Or, or, you know, trying to do some deep research or hold a lot of complex concepts in your mind while you form them into something, you know, workable. Uh, that's hard to do when you're, you're getting bounced over into a totally different frame.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Yeah. And so then when you say, wow, you know, I'm gonna try not multitasking. I'm gonna try long focus, like deep focus, I'm gonna try to just for the next half hour, just work on this one thing and not check my email or my phone or anything. And when you try to do that, it kind of hurts. It, it's very hard to do. Um, and you, it there's like this feeling of withdrawal where more and more you feel like the pull of your phone or the pull of whatever it is that you feel the need to check. Um , and that is not something that you're imagining that's actually like brain chemical action , um, happening in your head. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> , um, you know, fun dopamine, fun with dopamine, and yeah, <laugh> . So I don't have a lot of data about specific actions of wood bey on dopamine or other neurotransmitters, and I don't actually need it. I'm, I'm, I'm not that kind of herbalist <laugh> . Um, it's interesting and that's fun, but it's, it , it isn't necessary for me to do my job. But what you see very clearly is the ability to feel much calmer when you are trying to feel , actually feel much calmer all the time to when you're trying to come out of that fast switching kind of thought process and come back into a place of deep focus or at least sustained focus. Um, even if it's only for 10 or 20 minutes at a time, that like bettany really helps with that discomfort. And that discomfort is almost like it is pulling your energy up through your head, like trying to pull it out of you. And Bettany is like, no, no, you can just keep this here. It's all right . We don't need to attend to that pull . It's okay to just stay inside here. Um, it's kind of amazing. It's kind of amazing . And it's, you know, it's helpful for all kinds of dissociative emotional states. Um, and I, I, I actually, I kind of feel like all kinds of dissociative states are becoming more and more common, but that one in particular of like, that particular, I like that particular feeling that it's hard to put into words, but maybe you've experienced it, of that discomfort of like, I just wanna not check social media or whatever it is that you check for this whole day. I just wanna focus on this book that I'm trying to finally read or whatever. And that, that feeling in your mind of the gears, like kind of grinding every time that you get that little impulse to go check.
Speaker 3:Yeah . Yeah , yeah. Yeah. And look, I mean, we never wanna overstate anything <laugh> <laugh> , okay. That said , uh, if what we're talking about here sounds like it's connected to addiction, then you're not wrong. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> , you know, and we've, we've helped some folks deal with addiction and try to step away from things and, and the whole range of them, right? I'm talking from sugar to pornography to , uh, various, you know, drugs and recreational substances and things like that. And I think in pretty much all of them, we've put together a nice nerine blend, and it's definitely included beny .
Speaker 2:It's always , yeah. Always has beany ,
Speaker 3:Because with beany , like, you can say grounding, you can say like, okay, get the energy out of your head and bring it to your solar plexus. And for some people that has like a, oh, I know what that feels like, that movement. But sometimes the disconnect people are having is from their, is like temporal in nature, you know, they're caught up in regrets and worries or habits from the past that they're trying to change or trying to grow out of, or trying to mm-hmm . <affirmative> , you know, just get over <laugh> sometimes is all you really trying to do. Um , or you also see people who are kind of thrown into the future all the time. Like, I'm super focused on that thing that I'm gonna achieve someday , or I, I'm worried, I'm worried about the future. Um, for plenty of good reasons, right? <laugh> here , we're here, we're in the year , it's worrisome in the year 2023, right. There's problems on the planet <laugh> , and we , we've all , we've noticed, right?
Speaker 2:So <laugh>
Speaker 3:Yeah. So, you know, it's, it , but yeah, it's easy to get thrown into that state of mind and to, you know, everything from, to not appreciate the beauty of the sunset that's here now, all the way over to like, being unable to focus on your work or to get things accomplished or to, you know, enjoy the presence of people who are there with you. Um, and those feel like they have more serious consequences than like, oh, I didn't notice the sunset, you know? But yeah , we could make an argument about it, I guess <laugh>. Um, but yeah. But Beny helps to bring you temporarily into the, into the moment. Into you, into here, here and now. Right.
Speaker 2:Wow . I'm really grateful that you said that. And I sort of like, as you were saying it , I'm thinking about like, there's that sort of dissociative, I don't, I don't feel comfortable in my body that like, kind of pulls you up out through your head, but then that temporal that is sort of like, you know Yeah. Like, either you can't see my hands 'cause this is a podcast, but we
Speaker 3:We're gesturing like forward and backward because we have
Speaker 2:That . Yeah . Yeah. And like, where you, you feel like, and sometimes you can really feel this physically where you're like, I have to get this thing done. And you're like, but I also said yesterday I would do this other thing. And you're, you're like, and I just need to sit down for a minute. And you're , you feel like you're stuck between Yeah . These different temporal states where you feel each one of them you feel like you should belong in or you belong to belong in. Um, but none of them are the moment that you actually are in. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 3:There's this old adage , uh, which is often attributed like to Italians generally, or sometimes to a particular author or another, but it's sell your coat and buy beany . And I think about that. 'cause that comes from a long time ago. Right.
Speaker 2:I feel like that's like medieval kind a
Speaker 3:De a decent long time ago. Yeah. Yeah . You know, you can tell , uh, anyway, so, but, but I feel like that gets more and more true every year. Like I do want people to have coats, you know? Especially here in New England. Yeah. <laugh>,
Speaker 2:<laugh> , I don't know . It's getting warmer and warmer maybe.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah. E either we're gonna get 12 feet of snow this winter or none, and we , we won't know until it happens. Yeah. But , um,
Speaker 2:Anyway, keep your coat.
Speaker 3:You need a coat maybe . Here we go. This won't , this won't really work, but it's like an aspirational thing. Yeah. Sell your iPhone and gross bet . I knew gonna say that .
Speaker 2:I knew you were gonna say that. <laugh>
Speaker 3:Sell your iPhone and gross
Speaker 2:Bit everybody . What about everybody who's listening to this podcast on their iPhone? Ah .
Speaker 3:Um ,
Speaker 2:You can keep your phone. It's okay. Just, just go out and be with Bethany .
Speaker 3:Yeah. That's really what we care about more than
Speaker 2:The other part of house . It's really easy to grow. It really , like if you are a person who's like, I don't feel really comfortable gardening. I don't have a lot of experience with living plants. It doesn't need to grow outside, it won't grow in your house, but it will tolerate lots of different amounts of sun or shade. It will tolerate like a, a big wide variation in water. Yeah. It will tolerate crappy soil.
Speaker 3:Yeah. This soil around us has a decent amount of acids in it from the, the conifers mm-hmm . <affirmative> in the forest. So, and it's fine , but it's fine. And you know, like some of these came straight from a garden, which, you know, had been maintained for like 40 years in that place and was like super rich and black earth and everything. But the beany transition just fine. Yeah. No trouble
Speaker 2:If you, if you like some of the beany and Emmy's garden last week was, was even like up to my hip. Some of it was just amazing. So, I mean , if you give it happy compost and all that amazing stuff, it's going to become enormous. But even, even in whatever you happen to have in a bucket like it, it will grow. And I, I kind of feel like maybe we say this sort of thing a lot, but it really is important to grow some plants and to Yeah . And to like break down your inhibitions around thinking you aren't good at gardening or any of those things. Yeah. Not because you're gonna like overnight become a farmer or something like that. Farming is extremely difficult. I'm not good at it, but , um, but like, that's not the goal. The goal is not to become like some person who can grow all their own food overnight. And if you can, that's fantastic. But the goal here is to be with living plants to start to get to know how they grow and how they live and what their bodies are like. We know a lot about being human. Hmm . But watching a plant just live its life teaches you so much about plants. Yeah .
Speaker 3:Yeah , yeah. Yeah. It really does. And betting again, is a great choice for this both because like you've been saying, it's easy to grow, it's gonna tolerate conditions, but also like then you're with Beany <laugh> and that, that does help you like , like us, like us at the conference, like petting the beany to get a little grounded from the buzziness of the room. Yeah . Right. If you have some beany and you visit it every day and you give it a little attention, like that's gonna help you to get out of those multitasking mind or mm-hmm . <affirmative> or that thrown mind, you know, that habituated minds. Um, and so, you know, the , the old, the old story there of cellular coated and biy , it's like, ah , it can help with so many different problems. And I think that that is true. Right. You know , it can help with digestive complaints and nervous system states and whatever, but it's also that just being around beany , whether you're taking it into your tincture or you are petting the plant <laugh> on your , on your porch, you know , you're
Speaker 2:Co-pi with it ,
Speaker 3:<laugh> , you know Right. That, that brings you to a state that helps you to be more receptive and, and to be more like perceptive mm-hmm . <affirmative> about what's actually going on around you. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> . Yeah. And that's, and that, and that, that in turn leads to changes in, you know, your state of mind, your state of being, the way you interact with the next person you encounter. Like it does spin out from there. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> in a much broader sense. Also,
Speaker 2:If you think about the way that Beny is typically talked about , um, you know, it's often it'll have that kind of hand motion that goes from the head down to the guts and , and that that motion often accompanies when people talk about it being grounding. Um, like lots of teachers will kind of make that, that movement. And even if you don't make the gesture, like what we're really talking about is the path that energy is going as you like, drain a little excess energy from your brain that was maybe overheating a little and moving it down into your body. And all of that is tracing the path of the vagus nerve. Right. <laugh> and , um, <laugh> , you know, like people are starting to , um, kind of clue in around the vagus nerve now. And it's, it's getting a little more trendy to talk about and to recognize it's important in , um, emotional health, but also all the kinds of health because your vagus nerve like is, it's part of the parasympathetic and it's part of like rest and digest functions, but the digest part is important because that is the nerve that also is like connecting all the organs. Right.
Speaker 3:And, and you know, in some regards, this is a way to understand a lot of the actions of bey on digestion. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> , it's this, and then it's also that there are some aromatics in the plant. It's not aromatic like lavender <laugh> or chamomile , but it does have some of that type of chemistry and that gets into your belly and it gets things moving and it releases tensions and Yeah. All of that carries through. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 3:<affirmative> . Yeah. So beny is just fantastic. Tastes good, blends with lots of other things really easily. Yeah . Yeah. You know, we often make a blend called everything will be Fine. And <laugh>,
Speaker 2:<laugh> , it's , uh, it's best for when everything is not fine.
Speaker 3:That's when you take it, that's
Speaker 2:When you drink it. Yeah . <laugh> . Yeah .
Speaker 3:So, you know, Bettany is a really critical herb for that formula. I feel like if I didn't have Bettany , I probably wouldn't call it by that name. Yeah . I'd have to , I'd have to come up with some other name for it, for the , for the blend. But, you know , um, there's often some chamomile , maybe some catnip , some rose petals, tulsi.
Speaker 2:There's usually tulsi. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> usually , um, like bettany and then tulsi are the kind of like main points and then build from there. Yeah. Yeah. Build from there. Um, and everything will be fine. It's amazingly effective. It's kind of surprisingly effective. There have been times in my life that have been really stressful and then , um, you know, it's one thing to have a lot of stress and then another thing to be like holding onto all that stress and interacting with people mm-hmm . <affirmative> and , you know, I could do one, but maybe not both. And so whenever I had to interact with people, then it was like, okay, but first I need a quart of this tea <laugh>, and now I can go out and I can like be a human with humans. Totally.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah. So we, we invite you to share in that experience too. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> . Yeah . All right . Well, I think that'll be it , uh, for this one before we go , um, we wanted to talk a little bit about fallow months . So this is something that we do , um, three times a year , uh, for ourselves, <laugh> and also with our student body. Fallow month is a time when we really encourage all of our students to do some hands-on stuff and, and , and some face on stuff too. Like get your face into a whole pile of golden rod flowers, <laugh> like go , go out to the golden rod , you know, heery and just kinda like, be inside of that and Yeah . You know ,
Speaker 2:Get in there with the bees. Yeah. Yeah. It's, you know, it's this concept of that in order to , um, kinda maintain your highest productivity, I can't believe I just said those words , um, that you, you need rest time. Or another way to put that is you need to switch up the kinds of activities that you do. And so if you're out there and you're studying and you're like working hard to learn herbalism and , and improve your skills, that's gonna involve a lot of abstract thinking. It's going to involve a lot of actual study and, you know, maybe taking notes, maybe reading things, maybe whatever, and, and making those abstract connections in your mind. And that is a certain type of thought process. And it is, it's required. You have, you have to do it when you're trying to learn something, but you can't learn herbalism just that way. It's also really important to feel it. And so many people just don't have a lot of time. And so there's not necessarily time to do all your abstract thinking and then just take a lazy day and like, feel through all your herbs. So we have this sort of rhythm in our school of like every trimester, the first three months. Yeah. Okay. Study, study, study, great. Drink tea, that's important, but like, study, study and then take a month and don't try to study in that month. Instead, during that month, like, press out all your tinctures that you started and promised you were gonna press out and didn't, or actually make some sav that you keep saying that you're gonna make or try a whole bunch of different formulas or like, try and formulate stuff for your friends, or go outside and just look at a bunch of plants that maybe you don't normally have time to do. All of that. That tactile kind of learning is critically important. If you're gonna be an herbalist, you can't just have the thinky kind. Yeah. You need the feely kind also. Right.
Speaker 3:And that, that brings you to things like the tastes of the different golden rods that look almost, almost identical. Right. And that brings you to things like the feeling of that movement and that transition , uh, that shift when you take bet knee and you feel things move down in your system, right? Mm-hmm . <affirmative> , those are things that we can tell you about. And you might believe us, I guess <laugh> , but
Speaker 2:You shouldn't though. You should try it yourself. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 3:So , uh, in that regard , uh, we do have some, some ways to help you , uh, with, with these practices. We've put a bunch of them into a free course called Herbal Study Tips, and a lot of our favorite study tips there are really about getting out of your head, getting into your body. Um, I, I really like this philosopher Alan Watts , and he, he says, you've got to go out of your mind in order to come to your senses.
Speaker 2:Oh , that's kind of amazing. <laugh> . Yeah.
Speaker 3:So if anybody calls you that crazy herb weirdo, then you can be like, that is 100% correct. I'm gonna go to the garden <laugh> .
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So here's an example of a, of a study tip exercise. You can do. You can take some of your tinctures off of your shelf , uh, safe ones. Okay.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Ones, ones that are like gentle or like, you know, don't have any kind of interactions for you, right? Right.
Speaker 3:Uh, you can obscure the labels, like you can just tape some , uh, some paper around them, so you can't tell which one is which, and then you shuffle them up and then you grab one at random and you taste it and maybe you know the plant right away. And if so, that's great. But even if that happens, whether it happens or not, even if you know the plant, or if you don't know the plant, think about and ask yourself, what does your tongue tell you right now? Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, try to try to name the flavors. Try to like con uh, compare them to other things that you've tasted.
Speaker 2:Name the flavors as as like spicy or tingly or pungent, but not like spearmint. Right. You know, like try to name them in terms of how they feel on your tongue or , uh, other flavors that they remind you of, or , you know, often tulsi reminds me of bubblegum. Yes. <laugh> , you know, <laugh> like whatever.
Speaker 3:Yeah , yeah, yeah, yeah . Um, so this is a really helpful skill, like not only if you're, I don't know , uh, working in the , in an eclipse in a dark room with no lights, <laugh> , and you're trying to find total power out trying to find the chem mile tincture. I don't know, <laugh> , uh, it's not only for that, but , but this is training your tongue, right. Training your tongue to discern, you know, fine gradations of flavor. And then when you taste a new herb that you've never encountered before, after someone may told you it was safe, right ? Yeah. Then , then you're like, okay, what am I learning? What am I learning straight from the plant? Right?
Speaker 2:Yeah . Right, right, right. What am I learning about the chemistry that I can detect with my senses? And a lot of chemistry can be detected with your senses . Not everything, but a lot of it can be mm-hmm. <affirmative> and that it , the stuff that can be detected by the senses is extremely reliable. Yeah . Like , if you taste it, the action is there. So once you get really good at identifying those flavors, like the , that weird bittery metal taste of Burberry <laugh> , for example, like it's a very distinct kind of flavor and maybe you've never tasted or grape or even ever heard of it. And then you try some and you're like, wow, this tastes like berberine to me. It is. Right? Like, it , it , like, you can come to a point of relying on your own senses so much that, I mean, you can look it up because that's great, but if it's there, it's there, you know? And yes, if it's the first time you've tasted it, you might be like, I don't know, is it there? I'm not really sure. But you don't have to make that kind of question about apples
Speaker 3:<laugh> ,
Speaker 2:You know what an apple tastes like, and you know what pizza tastes like, and you know what jalapeno tastes like. Well,
Speaker 3:That's another reason to do this kind of exercise, right? Like, when you can conjure up in your mind the taste of evening primrose, tulsi, wood beany and rose petals, and you're like, yeah, that would actually make a good formula. Like you can imagine each of those flavors, you can project it into your mouth for a moment, you know , like , Hmm , yeah . Those , yeah , those would go together. Sure. Yeah,
Speaker 2:Yeah , yeah. Just like cooking, just exactly like cooking. Um, and even when you're cooking, that also is a reflection of chemistry. We don't usually think about it that way, but it is. Um, but it really, you know, that's what you're really leaning on when you're, when you're using those senses to, to formulate in herbalism. Yeah.
Speaker 3:So just an example , um, we've got lots of other cool herbal study tips for you in the course called Herbal Study Tips. <laugh> like all of our courses, this is based on video lessons. We've got MP threes you can download and take on the go. There's some documents to help you get yourself started. We've got discussion threads in there. You join our community, you get invited to our weekly q and a sessions and you've got access forever. So it's a pretty good deal for free. <laugh>
Speaker 2:<laugh> . Yeah. So go check that out, see if you like it. If you like that one, you might like more of our courses. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> . Um, so you can find Herbal Study tips and all of our courses@online.commonwealthherbs.com.
Speaker 3:All right . So that's it for today. We'll be back again soon with some more holistic Herbalism podcast for you. Until then, take care of yourselves. Take care of each other, drink some tea. Drink some tea. Soldier on and sell your coat.
Speaker 2:No, wait. Keep your coat.
Speaker 3:Alright . Right .
Speaker 2:Good <laugh> . Bye everyone. Bye-bye.