When you’re an herbalist, it’s normal to get questions from people about herbs. Usually they’re thinking that it’s a simple question, and expecting a simple response: “What’s good for IBS?” “Chamomile.” But the truth is a lot more complex than that! When you learn about herbalism, you come to understand that there are no herbs “for” any disease state. Instead, there are herbs who can exert influences on the body, and those may match well (or poorly) with the specific state of an individual person. So you become less enthusiastic about simply giving someone the name of an herb when they ask “what’ll work for…?”
This dynamic is even more pronounced on social media. Whether in an herbalism discussion group or in direct messages from your followers, an herbalist on social media will see lots of these types of questions – and lots of those one-word responses, too! But people don’t take the names of herbs – they take herbs! Which means they prepare tea (using this much plant matter for that much water), or they take tincture (made at this or that herb:menstruum ratio), or they get a supplement (made by this or that brand)… And so even if you give someone the name of a plant, have you really helped them figure out how to take it? How much to take? How often, for how long? All those details can make or break the success of an intervention.
When you get that kind of question, you want to give a helpful answer – and that can mean an answer that’s quite different from what the asker expects. Instead of simply listing names of herbs, try giving an insight into your own herbal thought process! For example, if they’re asking about “herbs for headaches”, you can briefly describe various patterns that can cause headache – heat, dryness, tension, stagnation, etc – and help them identify what kind of headache they have.
From there, you can suggest herbs to experiment with – and that’s an important phrase, “to experiment with”! Helping people understand that working with herbs involves multiple rounds of self-experimentation is a great service you can provide.
It takes a little more time to construct a response like this, but it’s significantly more helpful to the asker. They might expect you to simply know the right herb for them, and if you just say “it depends and it’s complicated”, that can feel like you’re gatekeeping. But if you share your own decision-making process, you both teach them how to think like an herbalist (even just a little bit), and you help them understand you’re not holding out on them!
Looking to improve your skills as an herbalist and clinician? Our Clinical Skills for Herbalists course has practical guidance for setting you up from scratch, or building on your existing foundation.
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!
When you’re an herbalist, it’s normal to get questions from people about herbs. Usually they’re thinking that it’s a simple question, and expecting a simple response: “What’s good for IBS?” “Chamomile.” But the truth is a lot more complex than that! When you learn about herbalism, you come to understand that there are no herbs “for” any disease state. Instead, there are herbs who can exert influences on the body, and those may match well (or poorly) with the specific state of an individual person. So you become less enthusiastic about simply giving someone the name of an herb when they ask “what’ll work for…?”
This dynamic is even more pronounced on social media. Whether in an herbalism discussion group or in direct messages from your followers, an herbalist on social media will see lots of these types of questions – and lots of those one-word responses, too! But people don’t take the names of herbs – they take herbs! Which means they prepare tea (using this much plant matter for that much water), or they take tincture (made at this or that herb:menstruum ratio), or they get a supplement (made by this or that brand)… And so even if you give someone the name of a plant, have you really helped them figure out how to take it? How much to take? How often, for how long? All those details can make or break the success of an intervention.
When you get that kind of question, you want to give a helpful answer – and that can mean an answer that’s quite different from what the asker expects. Instead of simply listing names of herbs, try giving an insight into your own herbal thought process! For example, if they’re asking about “herbs for headaches”, you can briefly describe various patterns that can cause headache – heat, dryness, tension, stagnation, etc – and help them identify what kind of headache they have.
From there, you can suggest herbs to experiment with – and that’s an important phrase, “to experiment with”! Helping people understand that working with herbs involves multiple rounds of self-experimentation is a great service you can provide.
It takes a little more time to construct a response like this, but it’s significantly more helpful to the asker. They might expect you to simply know the right herb for them, and if you just say “it depends and it’s complicated”, that can feel like you’re gatekeeping. But if you share your own decision-making process, you both teach them how to think like an herbalist (even just a little bit), and you help them understand you’re not holding out on them!
Looking to improve your skills as an herbalist and clinician? Our Clinical Skills for Herbalists course has practical guidance for setting you up from scratch, or building on your existing foundation.
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> Hi,
Speaker 2:I'm Katya .
Speaker 3:And I'm Ren
Speaker 2:And we're here at Commonwealth Holistic Journalism in
Speaker 3:Boston, Massachusetts. I'm on the internet everywhere thanks to the power of the podcast. Woo hoo . Ooh .
Speaker 2:Today's pod is a like insta rant pod <laugh> , um, <laugh> . No, it's that. I got a message on Instagram today, and it's like, really early in the morning. We, we basically just woke up and I was like, this has to be a podcast. And so I said to in , I'm like, we just have to make this podcast right now. He's like, I didn't even have a shower yet. I was like, I don't care. We have to do it right now. It's in my head. I have to go say it right now.
Speaker 3:So, hi <laugh>. Uh, what are we talking about? What's going on?
Speaker 2:Okay. We're talking about , um, like the short description of what we're talking about is why I can't tell you how to fix whatever problem you have emailed me about. And I swear I'm not just holding secrets back. I really just can't give you the answer. 'cause I don't know anything about your body. Uhhuh ,
Speaker 3:Uhhuh ,
Speaker 2:<affirmative> . But the longer issue at stake here is that we are, and honestly, we have been at this maturation point of education in herbalism in the United States. And like, you know, we, we started this like revival. And I put that in enormous quote marks because people think about like the sixties and seventies when herbalism was rediscovered in the United States. And that's really , um, not true. It was rediscovered by privileged, like middle class and upper class white people. Um, but herbalism never died in lots of places in this country. It never needed to be revived because people with Yeah . Traditional cultures kept it alive.
Speaker 3:Right. You know, to , to make that claim, it requires like a , a pretty restricted view of what herbalism is. Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> what , what it has been and what it could be. Um, you know, it leaves out people putting herbs in their food. It leaves out people working with home remedies from Grandma <laugh> . It leaves out a lot of things apart from that formalized practice of I go to an office, I sit with an expert, you know, they do herbalism upon me. <laugh>
Speaker 2:Yeah . They do herbalism upon me. But even that is like a real, like certain kind of privilege because there was granny medicine happening in kitchens all throughout Appalachia and all throughout the south and all throughout places Yeah . Where people didn't have the money for doctors, right?
Speaker 3:Yeah . So that word , that word office earlier that like, that's the key fills in for that place. Like, as opposed to the kitchen or, you know, the garden or, yeah.
Speaker 2:Right. So, okay. So, but that like, so, so we're gonna acknowledge the problem with the word revival, herbal revival, even though that is commonly said, but we are just going to acknowledge that and acknowledge the, like, the like white privilege perspective that that's coming from. Okay. We, we acknowledge it now. I'm going to probably say it a few times because it's a convenient shorthand, but we acknowledge that it's imperfect. All right . So that point of revival started like a child, right? Like, people were just wandering through the woods, literally. Like Rosemary was on a horse with her 2-year-old in the Rocky Mountains hiking and, and like froing, literally, and like, yay flowers. Yay . I don't know , I have a headache. Let me try this. And like, that's wicked cool as a like, personal journey. But it is also, if you think about it as a di as like a discipline of education, it is a very beginning point. And I think it is how most of us come to herbalism that, that we just are frolicking in the delight of this new thing. And we're like, woo , flowers, woo leaves, woo . Like nature. And
Speaker 3:So here we're doing like phylogeny is recapitulating on ontology. Ontogeny .
Speaker 2:This is, this is my husband. He has a degree in philosophy. Yeah . <laugh> .
Speaker 3:There's this, there's this phrase, right? Ony recapitulates phylogeny . And it means like, the development of the individual organism is a reflection of the development of that, of that species as a whole. And this, this idea is like fraught and it has a lot of problems, and it's like an, an older idea, but look at it as like, when you have a little , um, embryo, like that's on the way to being a fetus, it sort of looks like a little tadpole for a while , and then it sort of looks a little fishy <laugh> . And then it , you know, and then it sort of looks a little mammalian, but not all the way, like maybe entirely homo sapiens, this yet <laugh> . And then like, eventually you get like fingers and toes and everything, and that's pretty cool. Um, but now we're doing the reverse of that. You're talking about how like the development of the practice of herbalism, at least in this sort of boxed
Speaker 2:Yeah . Area . In this space, yeah.
Speaker 3:Uh, has some resemblance to the way that one person can come to the practice and start in the woods, or start with a flower Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> and kind of develop from there. Yeah.
Speaker 2:And, and so I wanna like really embrace the delight that sparks that process. I want to like , um, hmm . Hug it. I want to be grateful for it. I want to also be in awe of it like that, that this excitement, this like delight is what helps drive us back into connection with the earth. And it is critically important. And I want , I want every person to be able to experience it. And maybe every person doesn't want to experience it for plants. That's fine. They don't have to. They can experience it for rocks. Some people are super into rocks. Some people are super into like, whatever they're super into. But I think like all humans need that spark of delight. That's just part of humans, right? Like that, like finding the thing that you love and like really just face first right into it. So I don't wanna like put that spark down, but I want to acknowledge that it is they , the first step. We have all been there. Like some of you are, are in that spot right now because you just discovered herbs like a , a , a short time ago, and you're so excited. And some of us had that spark a really long time ago, and we've been in this practice for a long time. And the spark is always there. Like, it's always, it's never going away. Like that delight is always gonna stay inside you. But then the more you learn, the more complexity builds and the more like depth that we see in the situation, and we get, we, we just, that complexity is good, is what I'm trying to say. That complexity is important because systems are complex. Human bodies are complex, nature is complex. And we need to come to the point of developing that complexity in order to really like, fully understand the thing that we fell in love with. And so that spot, that is where herbalism is right now, is moving into that. Like the entire herbal community in the US is in this place of like, moving into that place of complexity, moving out of the simplicity of, Hey, this is a thing. This is amazing. And like nurturing and feeding that spark into a flame, into a fire that is ready to accept all of the complexity and all of the, Hmm , like the full interconnected systemness of herbalism. There's a problem when that happens. And that problem is that we have to shift how we think about the thing that we fell in love with. Um, most of us, certainly me, when we started herbalism, we were like, oh , I have cramps. What can I, what can I take for that? Oh , I have a headache. What can I take for that? And then we get online , or we get our books, or we get our, like, whatever, and we say, what's the herb for this? And then we get a response back from the book or the internet or the whatever, and we try it and it works or it doesn't work. And we say, yay, plants. I, I planted, I did, I did a plant. Um, I, I, well, you didn't plant like, you know, gardening, but like, you know, I, I did a plant thing. I I did an herb thing, <laugh> . And that feels really good. And so we just keep going. Like every time something happens, we say, okay, well now I have a cold. What's an herb for the cold? What's an herb for this and that? What's an herb for this and that? And we get into that habit because we start to have some success. Not always, doesn't always work. And then we say, well, that's fine. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. And we , we kind of accept that and we move on and we just get into this habit of searching for the one thing that I need right now and asking for the thing that I need right now. And when we get to this po and that's good. That's, that's like the crawl before you walk, the walk before you run thing, right? Like that's, that has to happen. It is good. But then a certain point comes and you start to realize like, it doesn't always work. Why doesn't it always work? Or, well , there's a lot of responses coming back about herps for headache. How do I know which one is the right one? Like, I don't know, do I just take the one off the top? Like, what do I do? And you start , you start because you are building experience. You start to begin to recognize complexity. And then we have to change the questions that we ask. Instead of saying, what is the herb for this thing? We have to start asking, how do I understand this system? And when we start asking that question, we start realizing that there is no herb for this thing. All herbs are specific to an individual. Hmm . Like, yes, tulsi does things and it will help a lot of people. Or yesterday in the community, somebody was trying to think of , um, like in our student community space, somebody was trying to think of some herbs they wanted to include for a presentation in their workplace. And they had this big list and we were saying, you know, just pick one of those herbs. And Linden might be a really good choice because it does help so many people has such a low allergic potential, such a low drug interaction potential, and it tastes good. So like, you are going to get more traction explaining one herb that is probably going to help most people and probably not going to hurt any people than you will if you give them this whole list of herbs. And it'll be a little bit overwhelming. So I don't wanna say that there can be no generalization whatsoever. There can, but when you really are starting to get into like, okay, I have this kind of pain and it is starting at my shoulder and radiating down my arm and ending with numbness in my fingers. There's not a nerve for that there . Like, we need to know more. That could be caused by a lot of things. It could be caused by a pinched nerve. It could be caused by a lot of tension that is restricting the flow of blood. It could be caused by damaged nerves, which is not the same as a pinched nerve. It could caused by damaged in some other part of the nervous system, the brain, the neck, the whatever. Um, it could be caused by an autoimmune state. It could be caused by an inflammatory state. Those could be coincidental. It could be an inflammatory autoimmune state. It could be caused by a food allergen. It could be caused by a sports injury. It could be caused by, like, there's just a lot of things that could go on. And if we just say, oh, here's the herb for, for like pain that turns into numbness and tingling. Well , the
Speaker 3:Oh, prickly ash.
Speaker 2:Yeah . Right. But there's <laugh> Yeah. But there's like not one herb that would address all of those different causes. And so when we start to get into something like that, like when it's just nausea, we can pretty reliably be like, well, ginger. And that's gonna handle like 75% of the cases. And it's okay. But when it starts to get to a little bit more complexity, the answer becomes a lot more complex. Right. Like the complexity is not linear. Like you get a little more complexity in your question and you receive a lot more complexity in your answer. Yeah .
Speaker 3:Well, I mean, one way I've been thinking about this recently has been , um, people do not take names of herbs. Yeah . <laugh> , they , uh, <laugh> . And, and so what I'm thinking about there is you, you know, you were talking about Instagram earlier, or if you look on, on Facebook groups of discussion about herbs and, and herbalism , uh, you'll see a common pattern, right? Somebody makes a post and they say, Hey, what's a good herb for eczema? And then people will start responding. And a lot of those responses will be a couple of words. They'll be the name of an herb, milk thistle, burdock
Speaker 2:Marshmallow,
Speaker 3:Whatever. Yeah. Right? And I look at it now, and I say, but people don't take the names of herbs. They don't take the word marshmallow. They might take marshmallow as a cold infusion and they might prepare that overnight, and they might drink it every day at a dose of at least a quart prepared with a couple of tablespoons of chopped marshmallow root per per quart of water. Right? That's something a person might actually take, or a person might take a couple of teaspoons of marshmallow powder stirred into four ounces of water and slugged right down straight, straight.
Speaker 2:Or they might apply it
Speaker 3:Topically or they might apply it topically or they might, I don't know. Some people take flour essences, some people take all kinds of different things, you know, so people don't take the names of herbs. And even at that level of just saying, here's something that you should try, people are often not even giving the, the , the minimal degree of specificity. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. Right. Um, and that can matter, especially for certain herbs where there's a big difference in what you get when you take them. Burdock is an example. If I take burdock as , uh, tincture, I get some of it's activity, I get some liver stimulation, right? We get some movement internally, but I don't really feed my gut flora. Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> . And so if somebody's problem is something that can be improved by feeding the gut flora and changing the composition or building them up, then burdock can be a good recommendation. But if you just say burdoch , maybe they go grab a tincture, they don't get that effect. Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> , maybe they buy a supplement capsule. Yeah . You can't stuff a whole lot of in inulin , <laugh> that prebiotic fiber into one of those little supplement capsules, right ? Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> . Right . Those are a different type of subset of the constituents of the herb . But if that person makes a nice strong decoction of burdoch, if they start eating it in food, okay, now we're really gonna feed your flora. So Yeah. People don't take the names of herbs <laugh>. Yeah. And, and that's only one part of what you're talking about here. 'cause you're also talking about like individual herbal energetic patterns. You're talking about that person's drug list <laugh> and potential Yes . Contraindications that might come around there we're talking about . Right.
Speaker 2:We haven't even thought of that yet. Haven't
Speaker 3:Even said that yet. We're , we're thinking about the rest of their health history. We're thinking about what flavors they like, you know? Yeah. Yeah . The , all of those layers can be completely left aside in these kinds of discussions. And the thing is that the person asking that question may not be aware of any of that.
Speaker 2:That's the real key. That's the , that is the real thing that got me started this morning. Because we get so many emails, y'all so many dms on social media, so many, so many with people saying, I love your this, I love your podcast. I love your newsletter. I love your whatever. What's the herb ? This , which
Speaker 3:Is nice, by the
Speaker 2:Way. We like to Yeah , we do like that. We like , like that lot <laugh> . But then the next part is, I've been having this problem. What's the herb that I need? And then I feel awful every time that I have to say, I really can't tell you. And it's not because I'm a jerk and I just don't wanna give you the answer. It's because I would need to talk to you for like an hour before I really have a solid idea of what herb I want to tell you, which does not mean that I couldn't just throw out the name of an herb and , and maybe it would give you a little relief. Right. I I really wanna be clear that, that yes, we could , I could just say, you know what, probably some blue vein would, would help you and it probably would take the edge off. It probably would, you know, make things a little bit better. But , but we can do so much more. And especially when somebody's asking about like really pain , like a big pain thing or asking about like anything with any kind of complexity at all. I don't want to just be like, oh, just say some chamomile , you'll be fine. Even though chamomile probably would offer some benefit. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> , we can do more than some benefit. Mm-Hmm . But we can't do it like a Google search. It has, it has to be specific. I have to think through the , anybody had , not just me, but like, yeah . Anybody would have to think through your body. Are you usually hot? Are you usually cold? You like, what is your background? What is your inflammatory state right now? What, so like how is sleep playing into this? What parts of your body do I need to support in order to get what your body needs to fix the problem?
Speaker 3:Yeah. You were talking earlier about like the state of herbal knowledge amongst the general public <laugh> and like the state of education amongst , uh, herbal practitioners and all of that. And we definitely have seen a greater awareness about herbalism Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> in the course of our careers. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Like a skyrocketing awareness in fact.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah. And you can look at that in different ways. Uh , where I was just looking recently at the, the herbal market report from , uh, the American Botanical Council. 'cause they finally got the one for 2022 <laugh> , uh, out there. And it's always interesting to read because it gives you some window into like, so what are people, what are people buying <laugh> , you know? Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> . It turns out people are buying a lot of cilium husk , uh, supplements these days that it's finally , uh, dis deposed elderberry at the top of the, of the best sellers list. Yeah.
Speaker 2:At least in 2022.
Speaker 3:In 2022. Yeah . Yeah. And so I look at that and I'm like, well, what's behind that? Right. And you can, there , there can be different elements, but you're like, well, is there just a lot of constipation going on out there, <laugh>? Um , Are there, are there people who are like finally getting the message that fiber is an important part of your diet and you can't really just run on carbs and, and proteins Yeah. <laugh> , um, like sugars and proteins, you know ? Yeah. Uh, is it that people heard that this is another good way to try to help your cholesterol levels <laugh> ? Oh, right. You know , because 'cause right with that one, it's like the fiber is gonna bind up some of the extra bile that's secreted in your intestine and carry it out before it gets recycled. And that can help to, you know, eliminate that stuff. But in any case, you just look at a trend like that and you think, okay, so what does that mean for people who might come asking me about things? And we look at that, especially when plants are like suddenly popular or when there's like a trend going on. Like, apparently people on TikTok haven't really played with that one, but they've been doing like chlorophyll water where they're taking like chlorophyll tincture, you know, like the, the chlor oxygen product or whatever. Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> . Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> just squirting it in some water and drinking it and being like, this is gonna solve all my health problems. And look, I love chlorophyll. I think it's good to get chlorophyll in whatever way you have to. Um, we usually like to do that with, you know, leaves <laugh> , uh,
Speaker 2:But <laugh> Yeah . If you just take the tincture, you are missing out on all the fiber. Like the chlorophyll is awesome. Yeah . But fiber too, y'all .
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah . Uh, and some of those products you actually have to be careful about your copper intake. You know, like there's Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> , there's things to be aware of. Um, but, but of course a trend like that comes around and it , it's usually presented as like it's a cure all . It's like good for everybody. It's, it's the miracle thing. Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> and herbs are miraculous, but none of them is a miracle for everybody. Like, herbal miracles are particularized.
Speaker 2:I mean, like, you need your own personal miracle. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> . That's, that's the situation. And, and it's not, you know, recently also we were having in , um, in q and a a a week or two ago, one of the students was talking about this. Like, the more that they learn, the more that they're thinking about how do we explain to people the difference between I need more information from you in order to give you the information that you're asking me for versus just outright gatekeeping. Yeah . You know, like, this is an actual complex situation and we have to work on it together for a while versus I just don't wanna give you the answer or just buy my course. And like, that's , that's the worst. That's the worst. That's when , when I really feel bad when I'm like, listen, I can't answer this question for you in a dm, but I do have a course that has literally all the stuff that I am thinking about and I don't know your body, but you do. And so if you worked through that course, you would see all of my options. Yeah . And then you would also see, okay, if it's this situation, then we would go this way, but if it's that situation, we would go in this other way. Right . But you know, which situation you are. So, you know, which of those two ways would be the right one for you to try.
Speaker 3:Right. And, you know, sometimes it's a , it's a, a , a two option decision, but Yeah . But
Speaker 2:<laugh>
Speaker 3:More often, like, we need to build a tree <laugh> . Yeah . And we need to have, you know, branching paths and some of them circle back and some of them spiral around and you know, that that kind of thing happens. Yeah. Um, but yeah, this is something that we, we deal with very frequently, and if any of y'all out there are, are herbalists and people are asking you questions and you've, you've felt the same kind of struggle, then here's one way that we often try to navigate that. So we'll say to the person, yeah, well, you know, headaches are different. Um, some people respond better to herbs that are warming and bring blood up, and some people respond better to cooling herbs that take the blood down out of your head. And some people need a really strong relaxant and some people need a little tonification up in your, in your skull. You know, so there are different things that one could try. Um, and that's why I'm not just gonna give you a single answer, but in the meantime, <laugh> <laugh> , when you asked me this question, you did mention attention pattern. And so you might wanna start out with the relaxants. Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> . Here's a couple of simple ones to give a try. Try skullcap, try bey . See how that does for you . That will give you some information. If it works, great. Okay. It seems like we found the right thing in the , in the first try. That's cool. If not, that also gives you information and that helps you make your next option right. Your next choice down. So we give some person like a sense of what we're, we have in mind and , uh, an idea of what , uh, what our decision making process looks like. And then we also say like, maybe you start with this <laugh> .
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:You know,
Speaker 2:I think that that part's really important because the key here is if I just list an herb, if I just say, you know, chamomile is my favorite for headaches, actually for me in my body and the type of headaches that I usually get, it's ginger and chamomile together. Right . Um, but I do have an outlier kind of headache that is , that does not work with ginger and chamomile like that, that one has to do other things. Okay. But , um, if , so, if I just say, well, ginger chamomile works for me, try it , um, it'll work for you and then it doesn't work for that person, then I've really turned them off to the whole idea of, of working with plants
Speaker 3:And also maybe working with you. Yes.
Speaker 2:And also
Speaker 3:This herbalist didn't really doesn't
Speaker 2:Know anything very much . I'm not , I dunno , <laugh> , but if I explain that there's a , that that there's a lot of complexity in the situation and
Speaker 3:More than it seems like
Speaker 2:More , more than you think. Like, like people don't think very much. Even when we work with clients and they fill out our intake form, usually the first thing they say when we sit down with them is, that was a long intake form. I have never sat down and thought that much about my health in my whole life. There's like the most common thing that people say. So like, usually it is more complex than you think. Um, and so if I explain a little bit about the kinds of factors that I am thinking about, and then I say, okay, try a thing, it might work. If this is the thing that you need, if, if you need relaxants, then these may help you If it does not work, that gives us data about how to choose a better direction for you. If we present it that way, then people know that when it doesn't work, or if it doesn't work, it doesn't mean that they should just go back to taking aspirin and forget that whole natural thing. I never wanna try that again. Right. They understand right off the bat that this is a deci decision tree. And if that didn't work, w that tells us what our next step is. Right?
Speaker 3:This is, this is actually also what we are doing in different types of contexts when we're talking to somebody and we wanna make a recommendation. So sometimes we have appointments that are two hours long and we can get the whole health history and we can learn about the person's habits and about their likes and dislikes, and we can get a good idea of what it's like to live in that person's life. And that helps us to make , uh, uh, a rational choice <laugh> of what to recommend. Right? <laugh> , sometimes we have a lot less time to work with people. You know, we might be doing a free clinic and have 30 minutes start to finish to, to bang something out. Or, I mean, we've done things where we were trying to see as many humans as possible in a day. We were doing like free clinic work in a underserved community or something like that. And it's like, all right , uh, tell me what's going on. Let me ask you a few targeted questions to try to narrow down as quickly as possible. Try this, come back tomorrow and let me know how it worked. Okay. Next <laugh>. Um, and so if we can try to understand what our thought process is like in those moments, oh, the person comes in, they're dealing with a digestive thing. Okay, is it hot? Is it cold? Is it tense? Is it lacks? Like, what are we doing? You are moving through those kind of thoughts in your own mind as you're asking questions, as you're making suggestions, you can help people who are brand new to herbalism do that. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>, this doesn't like you say about gatekeeping, right? This doesn't have to be like, well, you can maybe learn how to do that in 10 or 20 years. <laugh>,
Speaker 2:<laugh> .
Speaker 3:Uh, this is more like, here's the thought process we've got. Here are some of the considerations in mind. You don't have to understand everything that we have in mind. You don't have to know all of the decision tree that I'm envisioning here. <laugh> , right . <laugh> . But if you can see the first couple steps, then you can start to, to climb the tree <laugh>. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> .
Speaker 2:Yeah. Yeah. And so even when we're working in a situation like that , um, we even can give people options one, two, and three. We can say, okay , um, based on the information I have right now, I have some thoughts that , but there are still some variables. So we're gonna start with Chail because I think what's going on here is tension. And I think if we can relax the situation, that's gonna really help a lot. If that doesn't work, here is our next approach. And here's why I think it could be helpful. Like, okay, it wasn't just tension and relaxation, it was also that we need to get more blood moving into the area and relaxing wasn't enough to get the blood flowing. So we're gonna also add a circulatory stimulant. We're gonna add ginger to the mix. And then , um, you know, if the , if those two do not work together, then that means that I am in the wrong direction entirely. And the issue really is that there's just too much heat going on and we need to cool everything down. And so we are going to change strategies and go with like blessed thistle and blue vering and really like try to cool things down. Yeah . Okay. That didn't take me very long to say I needed a little information to figure out what my starting point was from, you know, from the person. But you can get that in a reasonably quick conversation, especially if you're not typing with your thumbs on your phone through a DM on social media. Yeah . But like, you know, if you're talking to somebody, you can get that information that you need to, to at least find a starting point for experimentation. And if you're communicating to the person that this is not the answer, this is our path of experimentation so that we find what is the right thing for your body. They, they definitely are gonna understand that people understand that all things don't work for all people. Yeah. And so if, if we are presenting it in that way, and if we that give them like a few options to try that helps them understand herbalism so much differently than just what's an herb for headache? Oh, fever few . Here's
Speaker 3:The name of it. Here's
Speaker 2:The name of the herb. Yeah . Figure
Speaker 3:Out how to take it. <laugh> . Yeah. <laugh> . I go , good luck. Go , go to Amazon maybe and yeah . Get the first thing that pops up or the one
Speaker 2:With don't
Speaker 3:Do pre prettiest label or the cheapest one.
Speaker 2:Ooh . Yeah . Don't do any of those things. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So, so anyway, yes. It is this complexity that we need to understand as people studying herbalism and not just understand, but also embrace, like it is time to just jump in all the way in, not dangle our toes, but like all the way in to the complexity of the interconnectedness of the human body as a system. Right.
Speaker 3:And by the way, there are lots of ways to engage with that. Like this doesn't have to mean that you need to go and learn physiology at an MD level, although that is helpful <laugh> . It doesn't mean that you have to go and learn phyto chemistry at a doctorate level, although some of that is helpful. Right.
Speaker 2:Right. Bit of it is helpful. Yeah.
Speaker 3:It doesn't mean that you need to , uh, learn how to work with a thousand herbs so that you have a , a , a maximally broad palate to work with. It doesn't mean that you have to learn all the intricacies of human relationships and social justice and environmental effects on health, although all of those are helpful to learn <laugh>. Uh, but it may be that you are more interested in one of those than another. Right. Or that you have a more , have a greater talent for one of those than another. Like Katya is really, really good at understanding people's emotions and how they're impacting their decisions and how those are impacting their health <laugh>, and then somehow explaining that to them in a way that they feel like inspired and excited <laugh> . She , she's just, she's got that talent somehow. You
Speaker 2:Know , if you think you can't give up gluten <laugh> , I can help you give up gluten. Yeah. Is what is what he's saying. I , uh, yeah, that is true. I do have a really high success rate of convincing people to do things that they thought they would never try.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah. But it's because you can find the, the motivation. And, and I think a lot of that is because you can like see the emotional patterns and the emotional history in a very short order of, of talking to someone. So that's like a particular talent. And that might not have been the first thing you thought of when we were talking about like, the complexity of influences on an individual person's health status and what makes the right herb for them <laugh> , you know? Yeah. Uh, but that's, that's one piece of it, you know, so there are lots of them and that's good news. 'cause that means you're not gonna get bored. And it also means that you can follow your, your talents and your interests.
Speaker 2:Yeah. I think what you're really getting at here is that the word complexity does not mean graduate school. All people are capable of a, of a complex understanding of people, of nature, of herbs, of systems. If you hated biology and chemistry in high school, that does not mean that you cannot do complex work as an herbalist. You absolutely can. It is, it is a matter of seeing the connections and asking some questions and even just coming down to the basics of energetics. Is this hot or cold? Is this damper dry? Is this tense or lax? And, and really coming down to those six things Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> it that it's something that like everybody can understand I'm feeling cold right now, or this person looks like they are too hot all of the time. Yeah.
Speaker 3:You know, and complexity there can, can emerge as you work with that system, as you work with plants with those concepts in your mind and in your body, and you develop your own nuance to them, you start to recognize like, well, sometimes you see redness and it's not only heat, it's not only frank heat, it's 'cause there's some dryness contributing to that. Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> . And I need to address that first before I just start throwing refrigerants at the person's face, you know, <laugh> . So anyway, like that, that is also something that can be developed. And , um, many of these types of complexity or things that you can learn to work within, and they may involve book study, but they may also, or even more importantly, involve getting in touch with your senses <laugh>
Speaker 2:Yeah. Like gut study. Yeah . You know, like, like that . That's also why we say that like, you, you have to practice this stuff. You can't just listen to us talk about it. You also have to go practice it because this is the stuff that you know in your gut, but you won't know it in your gut unless you actually practice it. It's like muscle memory, but it's your , your gut feelings, you know , it's like me .
Speaker 3:It's like , so like meditation practice, right? Like you, you meditate in a structured way on your cushion with the, with the idea that ultimately those mental patterns that you practice Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> are going to emerge for you when you need them. Like in a moment of stress or fear <laugh>. Right. Right. Or despair. Right. Those can be times when if you can get into that meditative state of mind and like see past the clouds to the blue sky and all of that kind of stuff, that's when it's actually helpful for you <laugh> . Right ?
Speaker 2:Yeah . The cushion is
Speaker 3:Like , it's a , it's an important practice. Okay. But it's about what happens off the cushion. Yeah. And the same thing here, like when you sit down with herbs and you taste them, you turn all your tincture bottles backwards and you taste them one by one and say, okay, that's fennel, that's ginger, that's calamus , that's Angelica. Those two are similar, but not same. Right . That's , uh, that's also that kind of training and practice. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Right? So the word complexity is not the same as gatekeeping. This is absolutely not, Hey, this is so complex, you're never gonna be able to do it. This is, this is complex and we just need to open ourselves to that complexity. But it is the complexity of life. It is the complexity that is not like taking exams in school. It is not like math where your math teacher, listen, you're good at math. Let me just tell you that right now. You are good at math. I promise. If you think you are terrible at math, it's because your teacher didn't explain it to you. Well it is not because you're stupid, basically. Actually nothing is because you're stupid. Hmm . It is about having someone teach it to you in your language in a way that gets across to you and also in a way that's exciting. Like
Speaker 3:Yeah, you gotta, you gotta have, you gotta like want to learn something to really learn it. Well, you
Speaker 2:Know, and Right,
Speaker 3:Right. Like when we try to like force people to learn stuff, it doesn't always stick because like they, you know, you pay attention in a different way if you think this might actually matter to me someday . Right.
Speaker 2:Right, right, right, right, right. So it is the job of a teacher to like hold your interest and inspire you and make you say, you know what, actually that's super interesting to me because that's what's gonna unlock your ability to understand it. So none of this stuff about complexity is about, you are not smart enough to learn it. It is all about, Ooh , you asked this question and I need to explain to you why the answer is not the simple answer that you think, and I'm not hiding my secret perfect pain remedy, but there's just a lot of complexity for me to get to the pain remedy that is going to help you specifically. Right. None of it is hard. Yeah , it is. It is just that there are a lot of steps involved.
Speaker 3:Yeah. And this is, this is a helpful thing to say to people, right? So to bring it back around to the inciting incident today , uh, if you are a participant in some social media groups or if you're getting these kinds of messages, then think about what we've said here today and about how that can help you to answer those questions in a more helpful way. Right. If there's a thread like that and you see somebody's asking about herbs for IBS and people are putting in ginger and peppermint and chamomile and this and that, it's a public service. If you go in there and say, hi, here are some thoughts, <laugh>, there are different things that might help. IBS can mean different things to different
Speaker 2:People. Right. There's so many different types of IBS. Yep .
Speaker 3:Yeah . There are some common overlapping patterns. Usually there's a spasmodic element, but not always. Sometimes people get that labeled just because it's , uh, the doctor wasn't sure what else to call their problem today. Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> . And they had to give it a name so we <laugh> , you know , so just to say there is some kind of complexity to that. Here's a couple of thoughts about places to start. Some of these other suggestions people have made are reasonable, but recognize that they may not be the best answer for you and that you can get to that best answer with a little bit of experimentation. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> .
Speaker 2:Right , right, right . Like
Speaker 3:I said , that's a public service <laugh> . Okay. If you, if you like, once a week or once a day, if you're really ambitious, you get into one of these discussions and you put a note like that in there, that's helpful to everybody who looks at it. Yeah. Um, and you know, maybe we can encourage some of those one word answerers to give a little more of their thought process <laugh>. Right . Like, those folks had a reason for recommending that herb. And maybe it was, Hey, I've had that problem before I worked with this and it really helped me. That's good. But if they were to also say, I had that problem before it had these specific features Mm-Hmm <affirmative> and this herb helped me in this particular way, that would be so much more productive, so much more instructive.
Speaker 2:Right. Because , uh, for all you who are still listening, here's the, here's the key. Every person's IBS is different. Just like a one word herb answer is not the answer because am I gonna drink it as tea? Is it a cold infusion, a long infusion, a short infusion, a hot infusion, a this and that ? What am I gonna deco it ? Like what am I gonna do? Right. The same is true for a diagnosis. Hmm . They are not the same. 10 people with PCOS all have different symptoms . They all have different expressions of PCOS. It feels different from one body to the next endometriosis. Yeah. There are some things in common, but there are a lot of things that are not common. And we can't just go spouting off herbs for IBS until we understand, hey, you know, what, actually are you constipated? Or do you have diarrhea? Because both of those get called IBS Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> . And the answers to those two questions are gonna send you down wildly divergent paths.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So just in the same way that people don't take names of verbs, people don't actually have the name of the illness that they get labeled with. Right? Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> , they have a set of symptoms, a set of experiences, a set of, you know, disruptions to normal quote unquote normal hormonal patterns, whatever they have going on. That's a , that's what's going on <laugh>. But that may not be identical to the label or to the, like the, the standard simple definition <laugh>, you know , uh, of the name of their, of their illness or their discomfort or
Speaker 2:Whatever. Right. So even when somebody, so if somebody just says, what's a good ear for IBS? Okay, well , whoa, there's so many kinds of IBS, but even when somebody is more specific, I have pain going down my arm and it's making my fingers numb. Okay, well, huh . There's a lot of causes for that, and I need to be able to tell you that there's a lot of causes for that because I need to know more about what's going on. Yeah. In order to figure out which herbs are ultimately gonna support that, just like IBS isn't enough, I need to know more so that I know whether I should tighten up your guts or help them relax. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Another way to like improve on those single single word, you know, herb name answers would be a simple if statement. Right. Well, if your IBS is primarily a bunch of cramping and like dry pellet poops, then get you a nice moistening relaxant herb. Could be Linden. You probably think of that just as a nerving plant, but sometimes it's the best thing for these digestive issues or get marshmallow or get a lot of seaweed in your diet, you know? Um, so you give context with a simple, like if it's like this, if it feels like that, if it looks like this, like that alone bumps up the level of help you actually given to somebody <affirmative> above just throwing out a nerd name.
Speaker 2:Yes. Yes, yes. Yes. Cool. All right . So for anybody who emails or contacts in any way , uh, we love you, we appreciate you, and I'm so sorry that always the answer is like, ah, it depends. I would need to talk to you for a really long time until I would really know. And then often I say, but listen, we have a course about that. And that would help you because it lays out all the different options. And then you, you can pick because you know your body, you can pick the ones that fit for your experience, what you are feeling in your body. Hmm . And I know it sounds like a sales pitch. I know it sounds like a whatever, but, but one way or another, no matter how we're helping people, we have to figure out a way to find out how they really feel in their body. Not just the name of what they feel, but like what does this feel like so that we can get the right solution for them. Yeah.
Speaker 3:And an analog here is like, Hey, what's, what's , uh, what's some good music for a party?
Speaker 2:<laugh>, that's exactly it.
Speaker 3:Who's at the party? What kind of party are we having <laugh> , you know , what do you actually like already? Uh, that can give me an idea, like, I'm gonna be your dj, but like, gimme something to start with. Okay. <laugh>. <laugh> . Otherwise you're gonna get polka . All right .
Speaker 2:<laugh> <laugh> .
Speaker 3:It's good for a party. Everyone feel pretty? Yeah , it's all right .
Speaker 2:Um , that's the best example that I have ever heard ever in my whole life. I love it. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah . So, you know what I actually want to , we normally do this at the front, but I wanna do this now because you might hear this differently than usual. So this is our reclaimer for the podcast episode, right? That's where we remind everybody that we're not doctors, we're herbalists and holistic health educators.
Speaker 2:Um, 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.
Speaker 3: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 keep in mind we're not attempting to present a single dogmatic right way that you must adhere to.
Speaker 2:Everyone's body is different. So the things that we are 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:Finding your way to better health is both your rights and your own personal responsibility. This doesn't mean 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's discussed on the internet or prescribed by a physician, that's always your choice to make. Mm-Hmm,
Speaker 2:<affirmative>.
Speaker 3:So you see how this is exactly what we've been talking about for
Speaker 2:This whole episode, <laugh> ,
Speaker 3:Right? It's another set of ways to express very similar ideas.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So we will go back, we will, we'll , we'll get back to the business series. Um, I have a bunch more types of businesses that I wanna talk about. Um, and , uh, that's coming. But just , um, I, I felt like this morning I was on Instagram and I was replying to a DM and I was like, man, here's the same unsatisfactory answer again. And I'm trying to apologize that I just don't have a simple answer and I just,
Speaker 3:And trying to give someone a place to start.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Trying to give a place to start trying to give a whatever, and I'm like, ah , I just need to talk about this for longer than I can type with my thumbs. I'm really bad at typing with my thumbs, y'all. I don't know. Mm-Hmm . And , uh, and yeah, so I, I mean, I still think it like it , listen, it would be awesome if we just could like give people the answer <laugh> Yeah . Like the answer, all that it be like, that would be so awesome. But , um, but we can't, and I do feel bad about it, but also I feel a spark of delight about it, <laugh> , because this is so exciting. It is so amazing to look at how everybody's body is different and to see the complexity in nature and to see the complexity in , in the way that we all show up in the world. And then to like, see that there are pathways to address all of it and like bring it into a place of, I don't like the word balance , but at least more comfort. Hmm . And , and I do, like, I just really do get so excited by the beauty in that. And
Speaker 3:It's like, and you want to go there and that's why when, when something gets reduced in that way of like, tell me the name of an herb for my problem. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> . Then you feel this like , uh, that's not gonna help .
Speaker 2:I feel so constricted. I know that's what
Speaker 3:You're asking for, but it's not what you really need or
Speaker 2:It's
Speaker 3:Not Yeah. Even what you want. Honestly, it'll
Speaker 2:Be disappointing if I give you the answer that you're asking for <laugh> . Yeah . Like, that answer will be disappointing. It's, it's, we will not serve you. Yeah. Um, and, and so yeah, like I just as a learning community, we just need to start asking more complex questions and we need to start expecting more complex answers. Because by the way, in places all over the world and also places in the US that did not have their traditions interrupted, this kind of complexity is take is like expected. They, they know what is complex in these ways. They don't, they , I mean, I'm making a huge generalization here, but, but it is, it's not weird to, to see that like, oh, well, hmm . The answer depends. Like, that's not a weird answer. Um, but it is for us 'cause because we're just coming to that point as like a body of like , making that shift in our thinking. Um, and a lot of people are still coming from like herb training materials that are from the seventies and eighties and like even the early nineties. And even though they're just starting learning today, they're learning from materials that are old and, and like, so we, we just have to keep making this push to come like into the, the new century of herbalism of , I dunno , whatever I'm like off in some weird where world now. But like to just like make that leap and just, and just recognize that the complexity is there and that, that it is, it is accessible complexity actually. Yeah. We just have to embrace it. Right?
Speaker 3:And that if we do that as part of the way we respond to these things, if we acknowledge the complexity, if we try to like open the doorway so you can start to see it and begin to lay out some paths to try not to frame them as answers, but to frame them as experiments. Right? Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> that acknowledging that complexity is not gatekeeping. That it's right . It's serving people in a , in the best way we can. And
Speaker 2:It's not scary and you're not gonna have to learn chemical equations or any of those other things that were maybe uncomfortable in school
Speaker 3:Unless you
Speaker 2:Want to, unless you want to <laugh> <laugh> . But , um, but it's absolutely not necessary. That's not what we mean by complexity. Uh , it is this like web of like the, the mandala of each individual person, you know, like the, the , the patterns. And that is stuff that anybody can learn even if you think that school wasn't for you, even if like you didn't get good grades. I just don't let the word complexity psych you out. Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> it is complexity that is available to you. We just have to say, oh, I expect there to be decisions to be made here. I expect there to be , um, like choices that I have to make as I go along so that I get the answer that's right for my body and not like any other body. Yeah. My body. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Exactly. All right . So that's that for this episode of the Holistic Herbalism Podcast. We'll be back soon , uh, with some more thoughts on starting Irby businesses. Uh, until then, take care of yourselves, take care of each other, don't gatekeep. Drink some tea, <laugh>, and enjoy the complexity <laugh> . Bye everyone. Bye-Bye.