Herbs A-Z: Thymus & Tilia

We’re on the final shelf of our home apothecary, and today we’re talking about thyme & linden!

Thyme (Thymus vulgaris) is our absolute favorite herb for a steam. Herbal steams are an amazing way to bring the plant’s medicinal actions into the lungs and sinuses – and the ear canal and eyes, too! Thyme’s a great steam herb because it’s so rich in volatile, aromatic chemistry. This also means it’s easy to prepare as a tea, tincture, infused vinegar, infused oil, or salve – it’s a very flexible herb.

Ryn’s favorite formula recently has been “Sweet Heat” – a combination of hot aromatic mints (thyme, oregano, sage, rosemary, monarda) with sweet demulcents (licorice, fennel, fenugreek, goji berry). Make it strong and drink it hot, and you’ll feel the diaphoretic movement of heat upwards & outwards in your body!

Linden (Tilia spp.) is a very friendly demulcent herb. Infusing it in water makes the liquid silkily viscous, but not slimy or snotty. This makes it a good choice for folks with dry constitutions who have a taste/texture aversion to the mucilage of a marshmallow or elm infusion. Linden’s a common street tree in cities, so you might have some growing near you! (If you’re in Boston, check out this Public Street Tree Map and you can identify every tree on your block!)

Katja’s excited to share some new information about linden today – it has activity as a quorum sensing inhibitor! That means it can break up a biofilm, which is a collaboration of microbes that resists the attack of your immune system. More and more herbs are being identified as having such activity. Although linden isn’t generally considered a first choice herb for wound care, this kind of info tells us it can indeed be of help in that situation.

Whether you’re a brand-new beginner or an herbalist with experience, it’s always helpful to study the herbs in depth! Our comprehensive presentation of herbal allies is in our Holistic Herbalism Materia Medica course. It includes detailed profiles of 100 medicinal herbs!

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

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

<silence>

Speaker 2: 0:14

Hi, I'm Katya . And I'm Ren . And we're here at Commonwealth Host Stick herbalism in Boston , Massachusetts,

Speaker 3: 0:20

And on the internet everywhere, thanks to the power of the

Speaker 2: 0:22

Podcast. Woo-hoo . Woo-hoo .

Speaker 3: 0:24

So , uh, we're continuing on. We're , uh, looking at the herbs on our apothecary shelves , uh, in the , um, alphabetical order by their botanical Latin names. And today we come to Timus and Tilia .

Speaker 2: 0:40

I think it's pretty funny that , um, we're still doing this. It , it, you know, we just,

Speaker 3: 0:47

It's been a little while.

Speaker 2: 0:47

This is just our home apothecary. But there's a , and it's not even right. I mean, it's like four shelves. Oh, five. 'cause if you count the countertop mm-hmm. <affirmative> , but there's a darn lot of herbs on the , those shelves. Yeah. Yeah . There's a lot of 'em .

Speaker 3: 1:00

But we're on the , we're on the bottom row, you know, we're moving along. Coming , coming

Speaker 2: 1:03

Towards the

Speaker 3: 1:04

End, I think if, you know, if 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, like six or seven more episodes like this, and we'll be there.

Speaker 2: 1:10

Wow. Yeah. Wow. Well, I think it just, you know, you walk in, you look at the shelves every day and you're like, ah , herbs, yay. And, but until you kind of like, decide I'm gonna talk about each one of these herbs for, you know, however long it takes, <laugh> . Well, it turns out this is how many herbs there were. <laugh>. <laugh> ,

Speaker 3: 1:30

Yeah. All right . So we're talk , we'll talk about time and Lydon today, but before we dive into that, just a quick reminder that we teach , uh, herbalism, <laugh> <laugh> ,

Speaker 2: 1:39

And , uh, not just , yeah . Not just in a podcast, not

Speaker 3: 1:41

Just in the podcast format. Yeah. Yeah. So we've got courses, we've got , uh, whole programs that can give you some foundational skills and even advanced skills in herbalism. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> , if you're ready for that. Yeah . You can find everything we offer@online.commonwealthherbs.com. And we hope you do.

Speaker 2: 1:59

We hope you do. It's a great way to support the podcast. Our podcast is a great way to get to know us, to see if you think that you will enjoy our courses. Um, the courses have video, they have audio, they have printable things, they have all the, everything you could want in an herbal, whatever, plus live q and a sessions with us twice a week. Those are not mandatory, they're optional, and they're all recorded, so you can go back and catch them anytime that's convenient. But we want you to be able to just talk to us live. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> . Um , so we make that option available too.

Speaker 3: 2:33

Yeah. Yeah. So again, online dot commonwealth herbs.com. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> , check it out. All right . And then we just want to remind you that we're not doctors. We're herbalist and holistic health educators.

Speaker 2: 2:43

The idea is 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.

Speaker 3: 2:56

We want to remind you that good health doesn't mean the same thing for everyone. Good health doesn't exist as an objective standard. It's influenced by your individual needs, experiences, and goals. So please keep in mind that we're not attempting to present a single dogmatic right way that you should adhere to.

Speaker 2: 3:12

Everybody's body is different. So the things that we're talking about may or may not apply directly to you, but we hope that they'll give you some new information to think about and some ideas to research and experiment with. Further

Speaker 3: 3:25

Finding your way to better health is both your right and your own personal responsibility. This doesn't mean that you're alone on the journey, and it doesn't mean that you're to blame for your current state of health, but it does mean that the final decision, when you're considering any course of action, whether it was discussed on the internet or prescribed by a physician, that's always your choice to make. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Okay. So let's talk about time. It's about time. Ha ha ha .

Speaker 2: 3:51

<laugh> , you

Speaker 3: 3:52

Know, you gotta make, make all the different jokes. Time is on your side. Uh , I've got time for that. You know,

Speaker 2: 3:58

<laugh>, <laugh> , there's , it's time for esteem . Mm-hmm. <affirmative> . Yeah , <laugh> . Yeah.

Speaker 3: 4:03

Yeah, yeah. Totally.

Speaker 2: 4:05

Uh , a few years back, I don't know how long ago this was maybe like three years ago, maybe four years ago, I had this great idea and , um, you went along with it so willingly and I had this whole like, little script for a ridiculous little video about doing time steams in my mind. And I was like, okay, you're just gonna sit there and you're gonna look really miserable, and then you're gonna do a time steam , and then you're gonna look really happy. And then I edited it and put in like sparkles and stuff. And , um, it was the silliest thing ever, but we repost it like every year around this time. Um, which reminds me, it's probably about time to repost it. Um, you know, just to remind people about time steams in cold and flu season, and now cold and flu in Covid season, although, I don't know , maybe covid season is all year round . I don't even know. <laugh> <laugh> . Yeah. But , uh, it's like one of the most popular tiny little videos we ever made. And , uh, you really had had , and I think your acting hat on that day, <laugh>. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 5:10

But I think, you know, it expresses the way we feel about time steams . Yeah.

Speaker 2: 5:14

They

Speaker 3: 5:14

Are rejuvenating and wonderful.

Speaker 2: 5:16

Mm-hmm. <affirmative> and they deserve all the sparkles or virtual sparkles. Like, don't actually put glitter in your steam, because that would be weird, but let's not do that. No, no. Virtual sparkle sparkles. Yeah . Mm-hmm . <affirmative> imaginary sparkles. Um, so I think that if, is this true? Hold on, let me, I do, I think it's true. I think if I were relegated to one and only one herbal format, I think it might be steams, which is cheating, because after a steam stops steaming, you can drink it as tea. Oh , okay. <laugh>. Alright . Alright . I see, I see

Speaker 3: 5:55

The plane

Speaker 2: 5:55

Here. You're ,

Speaker 3: 5:57

You're sneaking around getting an extra one out of it. Okay .

Speaker 2: 5:59

I'm, but um, especially when we're talking about respiratory health, well , lemme back up one tiny bit. The great challenge with herbalism, and I think this is true of many holistic interventions, is how will you get the herb to the actual problem? Like, you know, you read about , um, golden Seal, which is one of the herbs that contain berberine about it being like the herbal antibiotic. And you might think like, oh, if I ever have an infection, I'll just take that instead of antibiotics. But the problem is that it doesn't get into the bloodstream. The parts of the plant that are antimicrobial stay in the digestive tract. Okay. Now listen, that is valuable, super, super valuable because lots of, lots of infections try to happen in your digestive tract. So, great. It's good that we have herbs that can deal with that, but it, those, those constituents never make it into the blood. So if you have a respiratory infection and you think, I'm gonna take a lot of golden seal and it's gonna knock out this respiratory infection, the problem is that you can't , the golden seal's never getting to the respiratory . Those two things are not coming into contact. This is why steams are so important, because you are getting direct on contact , antimicrobial action, and you don't even have to wait for it to go through the bloodstream, the digestive system, the whole nine yards and get back to the lungs. It's just going directly to the lungs, full power, total potency right. In there doing its work. And , uh, that's fantastic.

Speaker 3: 7:35

That is fantastic. Yeah. Yeah. And you know, when you're doing a steam, you're relying on the volatility of some of the constituents in the plant, which can fight infection or stimulate immunity or both <laugh> . Right. You're relying on those being volatile and coming up in the steam so that you breathe it in. I say that because given everything you had just said, someone might say, all right , cool, I'm gonna take that golden seal next time I get sick, but I'm gonna take it as a steam. Yeah,

Speaker 2: 8:06

That's true. <laugh> , that won't work. It ,

Speaker 3: 8:08

It won't work because in that case, the antimicrobial elements in the golden seal, they're not gonna volatilize, they're not gonna float on the steam.

Speaker 2: 8:17

And so they're , they're literally too heavy. Um, not every part of a plant floats on air. Um, only the smelly things float on. Not every single smelly thing, but the majority of the smelly things float on, on air. And so you can breathe them in. And that's actually really cool too, because when we're done talking about steams, we'll talk about all the things that time does that doesn't have anything to do with steam because it actually has a lot more action and we always just make time the steam poster herb. But there is actually a lot more that time is doing , um, if you take it in different forms, it's just that this is such, like, such a good one. <laugh> .

Speaker 3: 8:59

Yeah. Yeah. Um, steam's obviously very helpful for respiratory issues, but first off, that's not just your lungs, right? Mm-hmm. <affirmative> , that's your sinuses, <laugh> . Okay. And , uh, your airway as well. So if those areas are , um, congested or there's a lot of stagnant fluid or mucus in those areas mm-hmm . <affirmative> , then time is gonna help to motivate that up and dry that out a bit. You know? Um, time steams are also quite effective for issues in the ear and for issues in the eyes too. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> . Um , so if you had a bit of an ear infection going on, you can set up a steam like normal, breathe some the way you usually do, and then kind of turn your head sideways and kind of tug on your earlobe a little bit <laugh> and try to open the channel. Or you can work your jaw around a different ways . You know, like when you're on an airplane and you try to pop your ears, if you are doing an ear steam, you wanna kind of move your jaw around, pretend you're a cow .

Speaker 2: 9:55

I was just gonna say, pretend you're a cow.

Speaker 3: 9:57

Yeah. Yeah. That works pretty good. <laugh> . Right ? So those big, those big kind of circular movements with the jaw, that helps to kind of change the shape inside the ear canal and allows that steam to get in there. And then for the eyes, you know, like a , like an eye infection , um, pink eye or ,

Speaker 2: 10:13

Or , or if, or if you have like a sty on your eye , A

Speaker 3: 10:16

Thigh . Yeah. It's like a swollen , uh, oil gland or a lacrimal gland right there. Um, or a little infection going on in that. But yeah, the, the time steam or or other aromatic herbs , uh, will do the job. It's, it's really amazingly effective for those kinds of problems.

Speaker 2: 10:31

You know, you know, acne as well. Mm-hmm . All different kinds of acne. Um, and, and that particularly because you're getting like a two phase action there. First it's the, the heat from the steam is opening the pores and then the antimicrobial action of the time is getting in there and killing off anything that , uh, is causing trouble. And once you're done, the, the pores are open and so you can do a nice like honey mask or a scrub or something like that to help get any, like, actual little particles out. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> . Um, it can be a really nice beginning to your, like a weekend face, face care routine. Uh, yeah. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>.

Speaker 3: 11:18

Yeah. Okay. Now, like you were saying, we can obviously take time in a bunch of other ways than just esteem .

Speaker 2: 11:27

We can take time for ourselves, we can take time for others. <laugh>, <laugh> .

Speaker 3: 11:33

Yes. Uh,

Speaker 2: 11:35

<laugh> , it just doesn't get old <laugh> ,

Speaker 3: 11:40

So we can make tea. Of course. Right . And , uh, like you said, it's important to say actually when you do your steams, bring a handkerchief, don't drip too much snot in there, and then you can drink the

Speaker 2: 11:50

Tea later . Yeah. Don't drink, don't drip into your, into your steam. 'cause then you can drink it if you do accidentally drip snot into your steam. Okay, well now you're not gonna wanna drink it, but your plants will let it cool off first. Um, but then you can water it to the plants. But , uh, yeah, there's so much good stuff in the time that is too heavy to get into the steam, but is still really important for your body. And maybe the first one to kind of focus on would be the like pungent, bitter aspect , uh, which is really, really helpful for digestive health mm-hmm.

Speaker 3: 12:26

<affirmative> . Yeah. Yeah. That becomes more apparent the longer you steep your time. And if you want to, you could even do this experiment. Right? So normally when we make a time t we're going to do a short hot infusion, and if we're gonna infuse it for longer, that's okay. We just need to make sure that it's really tightly covered because we don't want the volatile , uh, elements to evaporate and be lost. So we can cover it up. But just as an experiment, what you might try to do is take some time, make it in an open container, pour on hot boiling water, and then leave it there for several hours and then come back later on and see what you taste. And you could even like, make another time infusion basically the same way, but just for a shorter period of time or tightly covered. And compare the two of them

Speaker 2: 13:17

Right. The flavor profile is gonna be different.

Speaker 3: 13:19

Yeah. So the, the short ones and the ones that were covered, you'll still have those aromatic, those volatile elements in it, the kind of typical time smell things like the molecule ol itself, right. Things like that are coming through

Speaker 2: 13:32

All the stuff that tastes like pizza, you know, all the, all the seasoning kind of flavors you'll still have.

Speaker 3: 13:39

Yeah. But with the one that you've allowed those things to evaporate away. Now look, they're not all gonna disappear. Okay. I'm not saying that if you , uh, make time like this, it doesn't taste anything <laugh> like , like time in your food or time that you're familiar with. Yeah . But there is, there is a shift for sure. Um, and it's both like some of those volatiles going away and also some of those bitter elements emerging or becoming more forward. Um , yeah . As they, as they are extracted from the plant

Speaker 2: 14:07

Material, like concentrating it as, as it steeps longer. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Yeah. Um, I think you'll get more of the drying activity in that way too. Uh , some of the drying action is in the volatiles , um, but there's also just a stringency in the time itself that are not volatile molecule , um, molecularly related. Uh , so you'll have that. And so that astringency will kind of , um, like remind you of black tea . It'll , it , it's not like it's gonna be a stringent, like an unripe banana, but like, like black tea kind of as stringent Yeah . Mm-hmm. <affirmative> .

Speaker 3: 14:48

Yeah. Right. And when we, when we drink that tea , um, uh, say we made it, we did a short infusion, it still has a lot of volatiles in there. Right. Those are still gonna move around your body. Some of them are gonna get to the lung. Right. So time is an herb that can help with this respiratory issue. If we steam it, it can also help if we drink it. So why not do both <laugh> ? Right .

Speaker 2: 15:10

And it can help if you eat it. Yeah . Put it in your dinner or your soup too . Mm-hmm. <affirmative> .

Speaker 3: 15:14

Yeah. Yeah. Because , um, these kind of volatile com compounds when they enter the body, you're not gonna sort of leave them in there forever. They're gonna make their way out again. And generally that's gonna go towards the lungs , uh, and then also some towards the urinary system. So time isn't really like the first herb I would think of for a urinary tract infection, but if it's the only herb that I've got around, I'm definitely gonna prepare that tea and drink it up. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>.

Speaker 2: 15:40

Yeah, absolutely. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> , absolutely.

Speaker 3: 15:43

A lot of the same stuff we're saying here would apply to tincture also. Um, and tincture with thyme , it's really forgiving. You can do it from a fresh plant if that's what you have , uh, in your, your garden or on your porch. Porch popped array of growing herbs, <laugh>. Um, you could also do a tincture outta dried thyme as long as it was dried Well, and you know, what does that mean, Rin ? It's dried well. Well, you can tell when you open the jar, right? Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, you should be able to smell it immediately and it should be potent. Right? Ah, this is time.

Speaker 2: 16:13

Yeah. And it should still be more green than any other color. Hmm . Um, you know, I, I think a lot about quality of home drying and a lot of people like just hang herbs to dry and that's fine when you're starting out. But , um, drying like, the better that you're able to dry it , um, the better quality that you end up with. And when, you know, for a long time I did not bother with a dehydrator. And by long time, I mean like 10 or 15 years, I just was like, oh, if I, if I need it dry, I'll buy it or I'll just not have it dry, I'll tincture it, you know, whatever. Um, and then I started wanting more and more of my own dried material, and finally I did get a dehydrator. And , uh, it makes an enormous difference over every other method that I tried. Um, I think if you don't have a dehydrator, the next best method could possibly be to put it in a brown bag, like in a car or some enclosed hot space. I've always been a little weirded out by putting it in the car. 'cause there's a whole lot of other things going on in the , in your car that you can't see , um, like molecules , um, from all the plastics and stuff. But I don't know. It does dry it faster. Um, but, you know, you can often find dehydrator at thrift shops and they're, they're really widely available now. So I super encourage you to just sort of like, be on the lookout for one when you're, when you're thrifting or whatever, or if you can buy a new one, also fine. Um, but if you're gonna dry your own, especially when we're talking about plants with volatile oil compound , uh, content, it does make a huge, huge difference. Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>.

Speaker 3: 18:11

Okay. All right . Well, okay. Uh, we can also infuse our time into vinegar and , um, you may have heard of some recipes such as four thieves vinegar. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> , um, that's a , a sort of a traditional like, you know, Western European , uh, preparation involving aromatic herbs, basically pungent mints. Um, I'm not , I don't think Ru is in the mint family, but ,

Speaker 2: 18:42

Uh , no, but also nobody really puts through , like, that's, that's pretty of the

Speaker 3: 18:45

Old Yeah . That's sort of the, like, the like classic version, but yeah, it's true. Honestly, every time we've made four thieves vinegar, it's been like time and rosemary and maybe some sage, maybe some lavender even sometimes

Speaker 2: 18:59

People put peppermint in. Um , oh yeah . Which, you know , when you're making thieves vinegar, the purpose of it is not actually to be delicious. It's fine if you make it delicious, that's fantastic, <laugh> . But it is, it , it is like actually intended as a topical cleaning agent. Um, and so it kind of doesn't matter if you've got a bunch of mints with wildly different flavor profiles that are gonna taste kind of weird next to each other because your countertop is not going to taste that. Hmm . Um, or the wound that you maybe are putting it on, boy, that's gonna sting, but it's gonna clean it good. Yeah . Um, is not going to taste that either.

Speaker 3: 19:37

It does also give a , uh, an aura of medicinally to the substance when you get your little shot glass and you take your little half ounce of your, of your thieves vinegar and you shoot it down and you go, <inaudible>

Speaker 2: 19:50

<laugh>. That's true. Right ?

Speaker 3: 19:51

That is true. Then you're like, ah , this is working <laugh>.

Speaker 2: 19:56

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. So, so, and again, we're, you know, it's the same kind of strategy there. It is antimicrobial action on content, on contact , um, whether that contact is a countertop, you know , um, and it , it is fun to, like, it's, it vinegar is a great cleaning solution anyway, and that's that many fewer chemicals that you have in your house, but it's more fun when your vinegar smells nice with like minty things in it. Absolutely. Um, but it is really, really effective at killing germs on, on surfaces. So , uh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That is actually the whole story of the thieves vinegar is that , uh, yeah. You know, it's, I don't , I don't know that this story is verifiable, but it is , uh, so widely , um, told that I, you know,

Speaker 3: 20:50

It's an urban legend as part of the folklore of herbalism,

Speaker 2: 20:53

The myth , the mythology of Yeah . Traditional western herbalism. Yeah. But the idea here is that in the black plague , um, there , you know, people were dying left and right, and their houses had all their belongings in them. And so these four , um, friends got together and maybe a couple of 'em were brothers or something. And anyway , one of 'em , their mom was a midwife and taught them how to make this antiseptic solution. And so they would cover every part of their body and wear a mask and everything, and then go into the houses of people who had died of the plague and steal all their silver, you know, candlesticks or whatever people had <laugh> , you know, like whatever. And , uh, then they would wash all that stuff in this vinegar and oh, and they would put a cloth with the vinegar inside their mask also. So they were breathing that in the whole time. And then they would get undressed, burn everything that they wore and wash their whole bodies with the vinegar. And , uh, the myth goes that , uh, that worked really well for them. They never died. And well, I mean, eventually at some point they did die, but not, not of stealing things out of plague houses , <laugh> . Um, and so the myth goes on that the local authorities , um, the French authorities, because this , this myth is set in France , um, uh, the, the authorities took them, arrested them, eventually caught them and arrested them and said, listen, we'll let you go if you tell us how you're doing this. And , uh, then the story starts to fall apart because sometimes, you know, it's like one of those has multiple endings. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> , you know, sometimes they didn't give up the story and sometimes they did give up the story and sometimes they gave up the story and then got punished anyway. And sometimes they didn't give up the story and escaped and, you know , whatever. Anyway. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 22:53

Yeah. You can choose your own favorite ending on that one .

Speaker 2: 22:56

Yeah , exactly. <laugh> . Exactly.

Speaker 3: 22:58

Nice, cool. Uh, time. Okay. And then we can put it into oil. Right. Um, time infuses really nicely into oil. As many people who have made, you know, salad dressing can attest <laugh> ,

Speaker 2: 23:10

<laugh> , pretty , pretty

Speaker 3: 23:14

Straightforward. Yeah .

Speaker 2: 23:15

<laugh> ,

Speaker 3: 23:17

Uh , pretty simple one there. Um, so again, fresh or dried, you know, you can do your oil infusion and , um, uh, yeah. I mean, why not? Right? Make , make a, make a salad dressing, mix it with some vinegar, toss some seaweed into there. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> . All right . Now we're getting somewhere with it. And

Speaker 2: 23:32

You know, time is not a very watery plant. Yeah. It like , uh, even, even if you just harvested it two seconds ago, the , it just doesn't hold a lot of water. So this is a kind of great beginner plant to infuse in oil , uh, time also, rosemary , um, 'cause both of them are already like, fairly dry when they start. Um, so when you infuse them, there's much lower risk of mold growing in your oil than if you're putting like basil or something like that in mm-hmm.

Speaker 3: 24:03

<affirmative> . Yeah. And , uh, you could even take a , an , an oil infused with time and not just, you know, eat and cook with it, but you can apply that topically mm-hmm. <affirmative> it is gonna convey that antimicrobial effect , uh, from the time volatiles. And so you could put that onto , you know, a wound or some rashy irritated skin or something like that. It is gonna be heating. Okay. So not, not something too red and irritated,

Speaker 2: 24:28

But Yeah . And not something wet. Like it's gotta be just the right kind . It would be like a , a dry presentation of maybe eczema with a little cracking, and you're worried that you've got like some kind of secondary infection in there. And so you want , um, you want a little moistening action because the overall presentation is dry and you're trying to get the antimicrobial action in there too, because you're suspecting it . Yeah. So that would be a really good application for

Speaker 3: 24:56

It. Yeah. And to be clear there, the , the oil is the part that's gonna moisten the skin. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> , the time itself is , is , uh, is drying. So if we were to do like, time infused vinegar onto that tissue, that's gonna be very, very drying. Yes.

Speaker 2: 25:09

Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah . Yeah .

Speaker 3: 25:10

Okay.

Speaker 2: 25:11

You know, cooking with thyme is a, is a , a super legit way to get your herbs also. And I think of cultures where, you know, every meal had a lot of time and rosemary and , and sage and stuff in it, so much was going on medicinally there. First off, yes. Digestive stuff is improved. All of your digestive stuff that's the technical term is improved by adding time , um, and sage and rosemary and those kinds of things into your meal fennel. Um, but you also, like you said, the , like, eventually those volatile oils have to leave your body and they are going to do that through the lungs. Uh, so you are getting this sort of background respiratory protection all the time. And if you think about places in the world culturally where these kinds of herbs were included in all the meals, these are also places where like, it was kind of damp and people dealt with lung infections a little more than average. Not that, I mean, like anybody has respiratory infections all over the world. Right. That's always a concern. But, you know, in kinda damp places, especially, I'm thinking about like, you know, historic Italy where it's like damp and, and like maybe the roads are kind of narrow and the people are all in the city. You know, if you think about history times , uh, this also in , in like historical French cities or historical , uh, British cities , um, you know, people close together in damp environments and , uh, so just all the time there's always that kind of threat of respiratory stuff going around. If it's just in the food all the time. Doesn't mean that you're never gonna get a cold or whatever's going around, but it's like, okay, well we always have some level of background support going on.

Speaker 3: 27:08

Yeah. Right, right. You know, one other thing that I was thinking about with time , um, would be kinda less of a, less of a focus on the antimicrobial effects of it and more just on the heat and the, the blood moving capacity. So if you were to take time, maybe make a good strong infused oil and then prepare that as a salve. Now that might be something that you could rub into your toes. If you're a person who has poor circulation mm-hmm . <affirmative> down to your periphery and your toes get cold, or , uh, they turn blue <laugh> , you know, <laugh> , um, something like this, it could really just be calling on the heat and the warmth and the blood moving effects of the herb , um, for a problem like that. You know. And then

Speaker 2: 27:51

Especially if you put a little St . John's wart in there too , uh, okay, now you've got, you know, if if you've got any part of your body that's kind of turning blue because of poor circulation , uh, then that means that the nerve cells are also being undernourished while all the cells are being undernourished, but the nerve cells in particular. Hmm . Um, and so that's like a real , uh, a setup for neuropathy. Um, so yeah. You could make a nice combination there.

Speaker 3: 28:18

Yeah. Time. Uh, it's also just, you know, heating when you, when you drink it, when you consume it, you know, so this is one of our stimulating diaphoretic herbs. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> , it's one that we would take, you know, there's a lot of plants that we could say, oh, it's diaphoretic. Or even worse. Like, oh yeah, that's a good herb for fever,

Speaker 2: 28:36

<laugh>.

Speaker 3: 28:37

Well, what do you mean? What are we gonna do to the fever? Or for, or with the person who has

Speaker 2: 28:42

The fever, there's so kinds of fever.

Speaker 3: 28:43

Yeah. Right. So , um, so a stimulating diaphoretic, these are hot herbs. Uh , they're gonna raise heat in your body, they're gonna help you make a good strong fever. Right.

Speaker 2: 28:54

But, but also like opening so that you're, you , you get that good strong fever, but it's not gonna like be a runaway fever, you know? 'cause 'cause you're like raising the heat, but also like opening the window some . Yeah.

Speaker 3: 29:08

Right. So, you know, that includes plants like ginger and horse radish, <laugh> mm-hmm . <affirmative> , you know , and even cayenne. Uh, but thyme is a really excellent , uh, herb for that kind of thing, you know? Mm-hmm . <affirmative> . And so that could be, yeah. All right . We're in the course of a , of an illness. We're trying to raise heat in the body. We wanna build up a good solid fever , uh, here, drink some tea. It's gonna help you do that. Oh, it's time . It's also getting directly to your respiratory system. Right. Stimulating immunity there. Combating infection. So it's , uh, it's a really excellent herb for that kind of thing where a fever's coming from a respiratory infection. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> . Yeah. Um, I've also <laugh> , uh, I , I think , I'm sure I've mentioned this on the podcast before, but sometime in the last year I started making a , a formula pretty frequently that I mentally call sweet heat. And , uh, the sweet part is like licorice and fennel and maybe some goji berries , um, in a pretty decent proportion. Okay. And then the heat part

Speaker 2: 30:06

Significant is what you, there's

Speaker 3: 30:08

Significant proportion. Yeah .

Speaker 2: 30:09

Lots of sweet is what you're saying. A ,

Speaker 3: 30:10

A , a fair amount. <laugh> not , not overwhelming, but you know, a decent amount, but then the heat part is like thyme and oregano and minarda and maybe rosemary, things like that. Right. Hot warming aromatic herbs with some diaphoretic quality to them. And what I enjoy doing sometimes is to like, prepare this tea and make it real hot and drink, drink it pretty quick, and like generate a little fever for myself to be like, ah , yes, I can feel my pores opening. I feel the heat rising to my skin. I've gotta take this shirt off and put it over there. <laugh> , you know , <laugh> , it's , it's a good feeling. It's, it's like, ah , yeah, I'm really getting, my blood vessels will work out today. This is nice <laugh> , especially nice on a cold day. Or like if you, if you had to sit under air conditioning for a whole day, you know, and then you're like, oh , I'm just like chilled in here. Whatever time of year it is, you know , you can get that. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> , you , you make this sweet heat tea, you drink that down, you're like, ah , okay. No , I'm feeling a good and warm again. This is nice. Actually, I've done it a couple of times when I was feeling really sore , um, after like, an intense workout or a , a day of physical labor, and I was like, all right , well, what can I do about this? Uh, what's gonna help is gonna be blood flow and circulation and movement and clearing away the inflammatory stuff and helping the new building to occur. So yeah, eat some protein, but then like, let's get the blood moving. Let's drink some thyme and some oregano and some minarda and like, get that, that circulation of blood, like from the middle up and out, like up to the skin, out to the periphery, get that flow really happening. Um , I feel like it helps, I feel like it's a, a piece of the puzzle for like reducing soreness from exertion.

Speaker 2: 31:55

Sometimes I learn things for the first time on the podcast, <laugh> <laugh> , uh, for the , for about that period of time, maybe somewhat shorter. I have been drinking like a ton of lymphatic tea. And so even though usually, especially in the winter, we make like one giant thing of tea, like three liters or something to drink together. Um, for the last months , because I've been drinking so many drying lymphatic herbs , um, we've been making our own tea because those aren't really , um, awesome herbs for you to drink on a regular basis. Um, but I am a person that runs damp and I've been doing a lot of work , um, on the, on my leg health and the , my vascular health. And so , um, that's been really good for me. But, so you've been making, well, honestly, a lot of times, a lot of mornings you've been making my tea, but then you've been making your tea and I never, I I , I really wasn't like asking like, oh, what's in your tea today, babe? Like , it just, like, we didn't get around to it, or I don't even know what

Speaker 3: 33:04

Yeah. Well these past few like really hot days I've taken a break. Yeah,

Speaker 2: 33:08

Of course. Of course. From

Speaker 3: 33:09

This stuff for sure. But ,

Speaker 2: 33:11

But I just, it's so funny because first of all, you always have clever names for your tea blends, even if, I don't know that you do. Like, even if it's just in your head, you always have a clever name and I never do. And also that's such a cool blend and I didn't even know you were doing it. So here we all are together on the podcast learning about RINs tea <laugh>.

Speaker 3: 33:35

Nice. Yeah. Nice. All right , well, I think it's time to move on and , and talk about Linden.

Speaker 2: 33:42

Oh , Linden. Well, so , okay, here's the thing though, because that sweet heat tea, you mentioned licorice and you probably also said fennel. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> . Um, and those are moistening, but they're not super moistening. They're like middle moistening. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 33:55

They're the, they're the sweet type of demulcent rather than the slimy type. Right.

Speaker 2: 33:59

You know, which

Speaker 3: 34:00

Is so they can, they can like prevent a formula from being excessively drying, but they're not really gonna make it all the way moistening. Right,

Speaker 2: 34:08

Right, right. And those are the ones that are much easier for , um, for you to take. Yeah . Yeah. But, but I just, you could put some Linden in That's

Speaker 3: 34:20

A good idea.

Speaker 2: 34:20

And it wouldn't shift the flavor very much because all those other things have such strong flavors mm-hmm. <affirmative> . Um , but it would really moisten up the background.

Speaker 3: 34:30

Yeah, yeah. Yeah. In that way, Linden is a very friendly demulcent. Right. It's kind of on par with Violet. You can give it to people who have tried to drink marshmallow cold infusion and have vowed that they will never again touch such a thing to their lips.

Speaker 2: 34:48

He doesn't love it. It's really hard.

Speaker 3: 34:50

No, that happens sometimes. Yeah. There's ways to improve it. You know, when we've talked on the pod before about like, okay, you make your marshmallow infusion, but you also put in some licorice if you're into that, or some fennel or some ginger or

Speaker 2: 35:01

Cinnamon chips, chili spice. Yeah . Yeah.

Speaker 3: 35:03

You , you do an infusion there and that, that's, that's more pleasant, but you

Speaker 2: 35:06

Heat up and dry out your moistening, you know, just a little <laugh> , just a little bit, you know?

Speaker 3: 35:11

Yeah, yeah, yeah,

Speaker 2: 35:12

Yeah.

Speaker 3: 35:13

Uh , some other flavors in the mix. Yeah. Yeah . Um, but Linden is, is nice, you know, like even if you were to take a whole pile of it and do a cold infusion and shake it up real good and all of that, you're not gonna get a thick viscous slime the way you are with marshmallow. It's gonna be viscous a little bit more than before. It's gonna be soothing and kind of velvety on the tongue and in your throat as you swallow. And really nice if you have a scratchy sore throat. But it's not snotty <laugh>.

Speaker 2: 35:43

It's not snotty. Listen, if you're out there thinking, Ryn , what are you talking about? It's really quite viscous. Just keep it to yourself because he likes it. So we're gonna just gonna just stay there. Yeah. Or,

Speaker 3: 35:55

Or do a side-by-side comparison of like Lynden marshmallow slippery elm.

Speaker 2: 36:00

Right, right, right. Well, that's the thing. It's, you're right, it is as viscous as it possibly can be without being slimy. Like , and I think that's the, it's like, it's right up there and the next step that it just doesn't take is slime. And the slime is the part that you really don't like. But anybody who's out there thinking, no, it's kind of actually , uh, slimy. No, we call that silky here. <laugh> , we refer to that as silky. Silky. Yeah . And , um, yeah. Yeah, because sometimes , um, that's what you gotta do to get the good stuff into you. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> . Yeah. Yeah , yeah . <laugh> .

Speaker 3: 36:37

Yeah . There's always an element of , uh, social engineering in <laugh> in your , uh,

Speaker 2: 36:46

Yeah. Your herbal practice in like palate

Speaker 3: 36:48

Engineer. I do mean, I do mean for yourself primarily. Right?

Speaker 2: 36:50

Yeah. Yeah . Well, also, also clinically, but, you know, everybody has different tastes and not everybody is really very willing to just like gulp it down because it's good for me. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> , um, and even somebody who is willing to do that, why take, like, why make something hard when you could make it easy? And so all the way around, like finding the variation of the thing you need that is the most pleasing, or at least the least unpleasing, there's a lot of value in that. And then whatever helps you in terms of the story that you tell around it, whether it is like, well, sure, marshmallow is slimy, but Lynden is just silky. You know, like whatever that story is part of how you experience the plant too. And sometimes, especially if you're a person who , um, deals with like texture aversions or flavor aversions or whatever, you can't always talk yourself out of it. But if something is like right on the line and still strikes you as kind of pleasant, then really having a solid story around it can keep it in that space and not let it accidentally tip over into that place where it becomes a , um, an aversion. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> . So, and this is true, like right now we're talking about it about Linden because , um, you know, Rin runs dry and also prefers dry things, and it's not super easy , uh, and appealing to have a bunch of slimy moistening things. Um, and that is gonna be different for all people, but everybody has things that appeal to them more strongly, that very strongly do not appeal to them. Um, you know, whatever it is. And if, if you need that thing, then fi like all the tools that you can possibly bring to find a way that you can get that thing are fair game. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 38:52

I did put some Linden into my tea blend today.

Speaker 2: 38:55

Oh, did you? Yeah,

Speaker 3: 38:55

Yeah. Yeah. What are , because I knew we were gonna talk about it on the pod. So

Speaker 2: 38:59

What are you drinking today?

Speaker 3: 39:01

Oh , uh, well, there's a little bit of Linden <laugh> and some tulsi, which I probably could have put the time in there, but the tulsi was kind of drawing me a little more, some St . John's wart . And , um, what was the other thing?

Speaker 2: 39:14

Is there Rose had been , it maybe ,

Speaker 3: 39:16

Uh, SRIs , what do you call that? Yes . Robis Robus tea . Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 39:20

Mm-hmm. <affirmative> . I was like, there's something making it red for the red

Speaker 3: 39:22

Color. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 39:22

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. I am on day 325 of self Heal Amana . Um , not really, but it, it does seem like that is my, I mean, I have all these different lymphatic blends that, that, you know, I sort of cycle through, but when I don't know what to make for a long time when I didn't know what to make, it was just red clover . Mm-hmm. <affirmative> now when I don't know what to make it self-heal and Damion Damiana . Mm-hmm. <affirmative> , you know, 'cause whatever, doesn't matter how long you've been an herbalist, sometimes you stand in front of your herbs. You're like, I don't even know. Just get something in the kettle. I like, I don't know what I want today. <laugh> . Um, yeah, <laugh> , <laugh> Nice . Anyway, but Linden.

Speaker 3: 40:05

Yeah. But Lyden. So I've been , um, I've been doing a decent number of herb walks this summer , uh, with , primarily with the pharmacy students. And , um, I definitely have noticed a habit of mine, which is to begin my herb, walk under a linden tree . Uh, 'cause there's like four or five different spots in the city where I like to meet people and do an herb walk . And all of them have a linden tree right near <laugh> , right near my favorite gathering place. Um, or, or pretty close to it. Uh, one reason I like to d to visit Lynden on herb walks is that it's really easy to identify for most of the year, anytime that the leaves are present and especially, and it , and it is a long span of time when the leaves and then the B bratt and then the flower structure is present, then linden's . So easy to identify. Mm . You know, the main leaf, the photosynthesizing leaf is sort of heart shaped , but it's more like your actual heart. 'cause it's a little lumpier on one side than the other. All right . The edges have little triangular teeth around there. Um, and then, yeah, so there's that main leaf, and then there's underneath that something called a bract , which looks like a leaf, but it's a paler, sometimes green, more often like a yellowish kind of a color. Like a ,

Speaker 2: 41:21

It's like a lime green. Yeah. Not lime the fruit, but lime green, the crayola crayon color. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 41:29

Yeah. Yep . And then this time of year, they're, they're , they're gonna yellow before the, the main leaves stew. Right. So you'll sometimes see like yellow bras and , and still mostly green leafs , or not, maybe not like the most vibrant green, but they're still green, you know? Anyway , so you'll see that there. And it's, it's a different shape as well. Right. It's like a, like an oval, like an a long oval shape, smooth on the edges. Um, and then from there extends , uh, a little stem structure where the flowers are there. Or again, at this time of year, the little fruits, which are these little green spheres, you know, hanging on the thing. Um,

Speaker 2: 42:03

Also at this time of year, I wanna add too , is that it looks pretty ratty. Like Lynden looks very shaggy by this time in the season. Um, all of the leaves are like eaten up. And I mean, they ha they're still leaves, but they have a lot of holes in them. And also throughout the summer, you'll see a lot of different bug structures in the leaves. Um, like different kinds of little Gs or like , um, like a little kind of the top of a witch's hat kind of shape, like the cone that's kind of bent over. Yeah . <laugh> . Um , except , except it's red, but you know, still that, that shape. Mm-hmm . Um, and all of this is fine for the tree actually does not really hurt the tree that much. I mean, it , it could become overwhelming, but Linden can tolerate a huge amount of this. It is, it's, it is a, like community support structure. <laugh> , it is a nourishment structure and like, like a linden tree by itself is just an entire ecosystem. Um, but as a result, by this time of year, the leaves are not looking too , uh, too ritzy.

Speaker 3: 43:28

Yeah . We would ideally harvest the leaf and the flower together mm-hmm . <affirmative> , uh, when the flowers are at their most beautiful and fragrant. Right. That's like the ideal time to harvest your Lyndon mm-hmm. <affirmative>

Speaker 2: 43:40

In early June-ish. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 43:42

Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2: 43:43

<affirmative> . Yeah . And it's funny because in Ukrainian, the name of the month of June is the same as the name of Linden. Yeah. That's cool. Yeah. Lippa , I believe is the nice, how that is how that is said. Nice. Um, but that is the, the name of the month. That's cool. Because that's when the linden tree is bloom. It's

Speaker 3: 44:04

Lyden month. Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 44:05

It's lyden

Speaker 3: 44:06

Month. These kinds of calendars make sense. <laugh> . Yes. You know. Yeah . Uh, we'll see how they, how they handle the continuing saga of climate change. But , um, that's a different discussion. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, you know, the , the ease , the ease of identification for Lyden is a nice thing because , um, if you live in a city, you might have some lyden trees near you.

Speaker 2: 44:26

It's very likely they're popular in cities.

Speaker 3: 44:28

Yeah. They're a pop popular street tree. Um, and in parks, you know, in green spaces and things like that, if you're in Boston, I'll put a link in the show notes. But there's a really cool thing, which is a Boston Street tree map. Uh, and it's like, you can zoom in or you can even just put in your address , um, if you're in the covered area, and it will zoom right in, and it will show all of the trees that the city has planted , um, along your sidewalk. And so you can kind of like look at that map or I guess pull it up on your phone and then kind of take a walk around the block and be like, okay, I couldn't figure it out from my guidebook. But <laugh> <laugh> , right . We have <laugh> , we have a state evidence here that this is a linden tree, and that one's a , a Norway maple, and that one's a ginkgo and that one's an ash. You know, like, so that thing is kind of cool. Um, I, I hope other cities have a, a similar kind of a , kind of a , a map available. 'cause I think it's really fun. Mm-hmm . And , um, you know, we often have students that live in the city, and I'm like, all right , well, you want to get to know the plants who live around you and don't neglect the trees. And this will make it easy. So <laugh> Yeah . So yeah, you can, you can check that out and see what you think.

Speaker 2: 45:34

I, I think that's also awesome because city trees , um, sometimes depend on city dwellers, you know, especially if there's a drought. Sometimes city trees need a drink. And , um, so like, just anything that invites you to be more in relationship with the trees around where you live. Um, I think that's really cool. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. All right . Okay. But lyden, but Lyden.

Speaker 3: 46:05

<laugh>.

Speaker 2: 46:06

<laugh> , uh, alright . So usually when we talk about Lynden, we're talking about the nervous system. And um, you know, we like to refer to Lyndon as a hug and a mug, and we like to , um, talk about Lynden in regards to grief, Lyndon in regards to like, heaviness of the heart or weariness of the heart. Um, especially when there is also a tension component or a feeling of nervous exhaustion, or nervous depletion. Or sometimes people refer to this as adrenal fatigue. Um, yeah. You know, feeling fried basically. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Okay. But we talk about that a lot, and I'm sure in the podcast we have talked about that a lot. Yeah. And so I wanna focus on a different aspect of Lynden that I am thrilled about and that, look at that smile. I am, I'm so excited. That is that Lynden has quorum sensing, inhibition, actions.

Speaker 3: 47:06

<laugh> , you've been, yeah. You've been excited about this for like two weeks. <laugh> . I've

Speaker 2: 47:10

Been like, I can't wait to do the podcast so I can talk about the quorum sensing, inhibition, action of Lynden. Listen, Lynden is probably not a plant that you would think of as a potent wound care plant. Uh, but you should think again mm-hmm . <affirmative> , because it is so core , quorum sensing, inhibition.

Speaker 3: 47:30

We should have learned this lesson from marshmallow, you know, <laugh>.

Speaker 2: 47:33

<laugh> . Yes.

Speaker 3: 47:34

Right. 'cause there was the similar

Speaker 2: 47:36

And they are in the same family. Yeah,

Speaker 3: 47:37

Yeah, yeah,

Speaker 2: 47:38

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3: 47:39

Because there was a similar, similar thing, you know, when , uh, uh, even just to, to, to have heard it said by another practitioner. Oh yeah. Marshmallow is actually really good for wound care. Marshmallow can prevent infection. Marshmallow has a capacity to bust up a biofilm. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> , you know , um, that was a big surprise, <laugh> the first time that I heard that <laugh>. Um, but the more, the more I've thought about it over time and , uh, much more important than the thinking is the seeing mm-hmm. <affirmative> , right ? The doing , seeing , seeing it work, watching it help. Yeah. Um, that's been really impressive. And yet I was still kind of like, when you came to me and were like, Hey, I found this thing about Linden with Q s I effects. I was like, oh, really?

Speaker 2: 48:20

<laugh>.

Speaker 3: 48:21

Wow. That'ss amazing. <laugh> ,

Speaker 2: 48:24

<laugh> . I would've never thought. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 48:26

So, you know,

Speaker 2: 48:27

So if you're out there thinking this is cool, but what is quorum sensing inhibition? Um, that is , uh, the ability of a plant to break up a biofilm. And so a biofilm is when pathogens, it's not just bacteria. Everybody can do it. They all, like, they form integrated communities, they glom onto each other. And , um, and it is literally, it is strength in numbers, safety in numbers. Um, and so they form a like, raft in inside of the fluidness of a wound or in your body or whatever, and they begin to specialize. Um , and so certain of the pathogens will be the ones who are getting food for the whole group. And some of them are doing, you know, they'll, they'll do different tasks. Um, they literally are forming a mutual aid , um, community <laugh> .

Speaker 3: 49:28

We can learn a lot from these microbes.

Speaker 2: 49:29

Yeah. And that's not fantastic because it's inside your body and it can make you sick and you don't want that or inside your wound and it can get an infected and you don't want that. Um, and yet, and yet it is still pretty cool that , that , that this is happening. Um, so very cool. But , um, in order for a wound to heal well, we do need to break it up and have an immune response. The problem is that the human immune system isn't very good at fighting a whole life raft full of pathogens at once. Our immune system is really meant to go one-on-one with pathogenic cells. That's why they do it. Right? Like, that's why they form biofilms is to protect themselves against our immune system. And , um, so in order for our immune system to be effective against these kinds of infections, and this is where we get like antibiotic resistant staph infection and stuff like that , um, in order for us to be successful against them , we really have to break the biofilm up and then we can go ahead and fight them all one-to-one. Uh, so there's a whole category of plants that have been tested for this quorum sensing, inhibition, this ability to break up the biofilm. And a long time ago. Um, I don't know, you can, you can email us if you can find the very first time that we mentioned this in a podcast, but I bet it's in the double digits, like before we got to a hundred for sure. Yeah . Um, episodes , uh, where, you know, I just really think that because the more plants that they study to see if they have quorum sensing, inhibition action, the more that they find plants who have it. Um, and at some point I definitely was like, I think probably all of the plants have some of this some degree ability , some degree of disability capacity to do it. Yeah. And , um, so we don't know for sure yet because we haven't checked all the plants. <laugh> , but <laugh> , but Lynden has it. We checked Lynden and it turns out, hey, it's there. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 51:40

Yeah . Yeah. I think that's kind of cool. And it's, it sort of says to me, never underestimate your ulence. You know,

Speaker 2: 51:46

They're so, why does everybody do it? They're so easy to underestimate. Everybody's like, oh, well it's moistening and , and that's all. And we leave marshmallow there. We leave Lindon there. Oh, well, marshmallow. I mean, Lindon also gets, it's good for your nervous system, but like we just,

Speaker 3: 52:04

And your cardiovascular system,

Speaker 2: 52:05

We leave so much on the table with these plants because they're moistening, they're so lovely. They're soothing and, and it's like, no, they are powerhouses. Yeah.

Speaker 3: 52:18

So when would this be particularly important? Um, imagine a situation where you have , uh, some infected skin, but also there's a ton of dryness in that area. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> . Right ? This can sometimes happen even with a fungal skin infection, like athlete's foot, you know , um, where , uh, the skin is flaking away or peeling away, or there's getting splits or like open areas in the skin as a result of that. And some of those spots are gonna be a little damp, you know, if it's really exposing the underlying tissue. But the overall state is gonna be that dryness mm-hmm . <affirmative> . And so you wouldn't want to go and take time and do foot soaks in that and have that be , and let's say, and have that be the only thing you do, right? Mm-hmm. <affirmative> like you might do , you'd be too hot. You might do a time put soak and like attack the infection, but then after it, you have to do something else to soothe the irritation and cool down that, that level of heat. Mm-hmm . And prevent too much of the drying effect from, from persisting. So you could do a , a soak in time first and Linden afterwards. That could be fine. Um,

Speaker 2: 53:19

Maybe you're just really feeling raw and a lot of irritation and you only soak in lynden, just go with that. You skip the time altogether. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3: 53:28

Or we could put lyden together with a couple of other moistening plants, like we could put some marshmallow in there, or we could put in some seaweeds. Mm . Because those two have some really excellent topical antimicrobial effects . Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, you know,

Speaker 2: 53:40

This is also gonna be super helpful for, again, for dry cracking eczema , uh, because it's gonna soothe the dryness. It's gonna lower inflammation topically, but also it's fighting, you know, that that's the, that's the big risk with eczema , you know, I mean, it just , it's unpleasant. It's, it's painful. All those things are not good, but it's compromised in the skin barrier. And so pathogens are getting in through those cracks, even if you can't see the cracks. Um, and so a nice soak of linden especially, I'm thinking about , um, you know, cases of eczema where there's just a lot on the knuckles , um, or eczema that has psoriasis going on along with it. Um, all of that. It would just be really lovely to, to have a nice strong Lyndon soak. Put some, put some licorice in there too. Lyndon and licorice together.

Speaker 3: 54:38

Yeah. That licorice will add a bunch of like direct , uh, anti-inflammatory action. So will the Linden. Okay. <laugh> , <laugh> licorice is a little more a

Speaker 2: 54:48

Broader

Speaker 3: 54:49

Spectrum. Licorice is a little like more like intense or acute acting for, for inflammation, but Yeah. No , broaden the spectrum. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 54:56

Because they're doing it by slightly different mechanisms of action. Right. And so you get many forms of inflammation fighting action and several forms of , um, like pathogen fighting action. And like, just like you, on any given day, if you have one thing to do and plenty of time to do it in, you're like, this is no big deal. But suddenly, if like 16 people show up at your desk or wherever it is that you work, and they all have a request and they're all different and they all want it right now, that's very hard to handle. Okay, well that's what we're doing to a pathogen. When, when we get that kind of broad spectrum of action by, by formulating multiple plants , uh, in our approach, then it becomes really overwhelming to the, to the path pathogen. Yeah . To the infection factors. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> . Yeah .

Speaker 3: 55:54

Yeah. And you know, let us not forget, like you said, you said a , a while earlier that like people get gut infections, you know, <laugh> , or that there can be pathogens that try to infect your gut, like riding it on your food or other things that come in through the mouth. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> . Um, and so, you know, again, we don't think of like, oh, I'm gonna drink this Lyndon tea to make sure that my guts are in a good state and that we don't have anything unfriendly that's overgrowing. Uh , but in fact, that might be part of what Lyndon is doing for us. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 56:23

I do not know if this is still the case, but in Germany back in the eighties and early nineties, if you were in hospital, they gave you lydon and chamomile tea . Um, these are two herbs that have very low drug interaction risk , um, very low allergy risk. Chamomile has a little more risk than Lynden, but Lynden has very low risk of that. Um, and both of them have, you know, calming, anti-inflammatory, anti-infective, like overall vulnerary kinds of action. Um, and it's kind of cool to think about like, if you are sick enough that you need to be in the hospital, that somebody's also just bringing you tea . Like that can a tea that is like gentle but powerful all of the time. You're just like, oh, more tea. Yeah . Uh , yeah, that sounds great.

Speaker 3: 57:22

That seems good. Yeah. When you go to the hospital in America, do they bring you coffee?

Speaker 2: 57:28

<laugh>, Coke? Probably <laugh> . Okay .

Speaker 3: 57:33

All right . Let's let , let's leave that there. <laugh> . Um , All right , very good. So yeah, so there's some, there's some fun lyden thoughts for you today. All right then. So just to wrap up , uh, I wanted to put a plug for one of the courses we haven't mentioned for quite a while on the pod. That's our RIA Medica course. Mm . Which is a little similar to this series of episodes we've been doing now for however long it's been. Um, material medica means the medicinal materials, and so , um, this , uh, this course is about the herbs themselves. Mm . Trying to look at each individual herb in as much of its multiplicity of powers as we can. Right. Trying to do the opposite of shoe boxing your or pigeonholing your herb , your

Speaker 2: 58:18

Herbs. Right, right. Trying to like, like get in depth with all the different ways that every herb acts. So instead of being really specific about just one kind of action, which we do in like the cardiovascular course, we talk about herbs from a cardiovascular per , per perspective. And in the, you know, digestive course we're talking about the herbs, sometimes the same herbs, but from the digestive perspective. But we wanted there to be a place where we talked about the herbs from the herbs perspective, just to give like a 360 degree view of each herb.

Speaker 3: 58:54

Yeah. To try and think about, okay, well what are the basic qualities here? What are the flavors? What are the, the empirically observed actions of the plant when we take it? What does that mean for what kind of health problems it can help out with? Um, and trying to see that in a broad sense and to be like, all right, well, often we talk about Linden for the heart or for the nervous system, but hey, there's these other applications for your skin or for, you know, whatever else we're, we're gonna be dealing with. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> . And we also talk there too about, about like, okay, so there's lots of different ways to prepare this plant. Right? You can, this one's really good for steam and for incense and for a nice hot tea. 'cause it's time and it's full of those aromatics, <laugh>, this other one is much better as a cold infusion or doing a , an oil infusion or, or whatever else. Right. So again, trying to just give you , um, a , a broad understanding of the plant so that it doesn't get into your head that, you know, meadowsweet is good for migraines and chamomile is good for gut cramps, and, you know, and that's like the, the , the box in the herb has a lot of trouble getting out of it. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 59:55

Yeah.

Speaker 3: 59:55

Mm-hmm. <affirmative>

Speaker 2: 59:57

Don't want to put your herbs in boxes.

Speaker 3: 59:59

Yeah. Put them in maybe some nice jars or <laugh>

Speaker 2: 1:00:02

<laugh>

Speaker 3: 1:00:03

Air , air proof container. That'll be fine .

Speaker 2: 1:00:04

Yeah, that's good. <laugh> <laugh> .

Speaker 3: 1:00:06

Yeah. So material medical study , um, is really valuable. It's also a great place to begin. If you're new to herbalism, maybe you've listened to a few episodes of the podcast, you think this is something you want to get further into. Um, then of course, like this is a really good place to begin. Uh, in the , in the context or in the, in the, as we go along teaching about individual herbs, we're also , um, introducing really critical concepts. You know, like the course begins with an , an entry on ginger, and so we talk about ginger, but we also talk about what is a carminative <laugh> , right . <laugh> , you know, like what does that category of herbs mean and what can we do with any carminative mm-hmm . <affirmative> and Ginger's a great standout example for this and that reason, you know mm-hmm . <affirmative> . So as you go through, you're also picking up some information about medicine making and some information about formulation and like, which herbs are good friends to each other. Um, understanding the connections between flavor and action. So it's a , it's a , a very rich , uh, learning experience, we think . Mm-hmm . <affirmative> ,

Speaker 2: 1:01:06

<laugh> , uh, like all of our courses, it includes all of the video lessons, which in this particular, this is a very large course. There's , um, more than a hundred herbs covered, and it is a lot of hours of videos for you to peruse at your convenience. You have lifetime access, so you don't have to hurry. There's also mp threes, there's PDFs, there's discussion threads where you can ask your questions and we answer them the next day. Um, you get access to our student community, you're invited to our live q and a sessions , uh, the whole kit and caboodle, which is quite a kit in all of the caboodle. Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> <laugh>.

Speaker 3: 1:01:45

So you can find that as well as all of our courses@online.commonwealthherbs.com

Speaker 2: 1:01:52

Online dot commonwealth herbs.com. <laugh> <laugh> .

Speaker 3: 1:01:58

All right . I, I think I've got a good closing line today, but we just need to remember that sometimes you do want to take your Lynden tea and you want to make a cold infusion and get it really nice and, and Demulcent. And ous . Yeah. And sometimes you want to drink that down. Yes. Okay. So we're just gonna keep that in mind as we say. That's it for the Holistic Herbalism Podcast. This week will be more, we'll be back with some more for you soon. Until then, take care of yourselves. Take care of each other. Drink some tea. Drink some tea. Take your time and slurp your slime. Oh , <laugh> . Oh my goodness. You did it <laugh> . That's , see , you didn't type it ahead of time so that I wouldn't No , I had to not give it away. Yeah , yeah . <laugh> . Oh my goodness. Okay. You're welcome. And , and , and , and goodbye . Bye-bye .

Speaker 1: 1:02:51

Oh , that's .