Heart of Herbs Herbal School Podcast
Welcome to the Heart of Herbs Herbal School Podcast, with Demetria Clark.
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At Heart of Herbs Herbal School (www.heartofherbs.com), we are passionate about sharing herbalism's time-honored traditions and modern insights. Whether you're a seasoned herbalist or just beginning your herbal journey, our videos are crafted to inspire, educate, and guide you toward herbal wellness.
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Heart of Herbs Herbal School Podcast
Unearthing Herbal Wisdom: A Journey with Lisa Ganora
In this enriching episode, we dive deep into the captivating world of herbalism with the esteemed Lisa Ganora. Known for her vibrant approach to medicinal plants, Lisa shares her personal journey that began with a transformative dream and led her down the path of herbal education. The episode explores the significance of herbal constituents and how they interact with the body, emphasizing an essential blend of scientific understanding and holistic practices.
As we navigate through fascinating stories of her experiences with plants, listeners will come to appreciate the rich tapestry that is herbal medicine. From battling food cravings using herbal remedies to the importance of connecting with the spirit of each plant, Lisa offers a wealth of knowledge that empowers individuals to take charge of their health. She reminds us that herbalism is not merely about remedies; it's a profound relationship with the earth and an intricate dance of biochemistry.
Join us as we unravel these complexities, taking with us key insights into the art and science of herbal healing. Don't forget to tune in, share, and explore how you can incorporate the wisdom of plants into your life!
Heart of Herbs Herbal School
The Heart of Herbs Podcast with Demetria Clark! 🌿 Tune in for herbal wisdom & wellness tips!
Welcome to the Heart of Herbs Herbal School Podcast, www.heartofherbs.com where we explore the world of herbal remedies and natural health solutions. Before we dive into today's episode, If you want to enroll, use code PODCAST to save 20%.
The content provided in this podcast is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease or medical condition. It is always recommended to consult with a qualified healthcare professional
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Hello, this is Demetra Clark, the director of Heart of Herbs Herbal School, and today on the Heart of Herbs Herbal School podcast I know it's a mouthful is Lisa Ganora who runs herbalconstituentscom, is that correct? Yes, ma'am, and she has the herbal constituents book on the market. Herbal constituents book on the market, and it's a resource that we encourage our students to to purchase and to use, and I'm just so excited to have you on here today. We even have a lecture from you in our in our student materials, and one of the things I always hear is I never thought constituents could be so much fun. So our people are huge fans and we are so grateful that you were willing to do that with us. I think it was about what two years ago now, three years ago now it's been a while.
Speaker 2:Who knows, time does weird things lately.
Speaker 1:But I wanted to say welcome and thank you so much for being here. Can you please just tell us a little bit about yourself?
Speaker 2:Sure, sure, you know, let's see how far back, how far back do we go? 1986, I lived on Cape Cod. I started hearing about, hmm, like women, healers and herbs kind of hovering around. I'm like, oh, what's all this? And you know, back back then it was in Provincetown, so I was kind of out in the ocean and I had I was trying to figure my life out, right. I was like who am I? I had I was trying to figure my life out, right. I was like who am I? Am I an artist? Am I a photographer? Am I a classical musician? Who am I? What am I supposed to be doing on this earth?
Speaker 2:And I started having dreams, right, and I started dreaming. In one of these dreams, this elder, native elder, was sitting down in a kiva with her, back to me, and she had some things arranged out in front of her. And I walked up and it was a lucid dream, right. I walked up in the dream and I saw her and I stopped and I'm like, oh, I shouldn't bother this person, they're doing something important. And then I stood there for a minute and thought and and I'm like I'm here and she's here in this dream.
Speaker 1:Which is mine.
Speaker 2:Don't walk away. So I, you know very respectfully walked down in and sat down opposite of her and after a little while she looked up and she said to me well, I knew you were coming, but I didn't think it would take this long to me. Well, I knew you were coming, but I didn't think it would take this long.
Speaker 1:Don't you love it when your dreams have attitude.
Speaker 2:I know, and I was like, okay, this is for real, I will not look away, I'm going to pay attention. Um, and she showed me three things that were laid out, three ceremonial objects, and one of them was a wreath made of herbs, with herbs twisted all around the grapevines. And she pointed to everything and she said memorize these. And so I looked at them for a while and memorized them, and then she looked up at me and she didn't tell me what to do. She didn't tell me how to do it. She just looked up at me and got this big smile on her face and dissolved and vanished and I woke up and went. What happens here? What am I supposed to? Who was that? And you know short story I had a series of dreams like that when I was out there and it the plants were calling to me, and so I followed that.
Speaker 2:I followed up with that by um, uh, my first herb that I used medicinally was dandelion root. Right, and I had gotten like super addicted to chocolate. It's crazy. I was eating so much of it.
Speaker 2:I was was making myself sick and I was so ignorant of health I didn't even realize that, like the chocolate was followed an hour later by the blood sugar crash and I felt terrible. And then I eat more chocolate and I'd be great again, you know. So I went through this wrangle with that and a friend of mine turned me on to dandelion root and she's like you know, when you get the craving, drink the dandelion root tea. She showed me how to make a really strong tea with it, like an infusion, and just drink a cup of the tea and then don't fight with yourself because you're going to lose. If it's like you know, an addictive kind of relationship you're going to lose. Don't fight with yourself, just do what you got to do, but always drink the tea first.
Speaker 2:And I did it. And the first time I kid you not I went to eat the chocolate bar and stay eating the whole thing. I ate half. And then my body was like good enough, and that was one cup of dandelion root tea, I know right. So I kept doing it and I was all skeptical and stuff. I'm drinking weeds. This is super weird, you know. But I kept doing it and it kept working and after about two weeks I had zero desire for chocolate anymore and I was like I need to learn about these herbs because nobody in school, like I've been to college and stuff, nobody in school told me that this was a real thing, right, and I was pre-med studies and and it's all like, isn't that funny superstition that your, your grandma, used to do? Ha ha, study the real medicine over here. You know old wives tale? Yeah, oh, that was an old wife down on the internet.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You know. So I yeah the dandy, the dreams and the dandelion, and a whole world started opening up. I'm like I really need to know about this. So I connected 1986, I connected with the Wise Woman Center up in Saugerties, new York, susan Weed's place, and I was like broke ass, I didn't have any money. So I wrote an actual letter before we had the internet y'all, oh my gosh and I sent it up there and I said, hey, I do photography, I can trade. Can I come up? This dream happened and so I got invited up there and it was a summer solstice event.
Speaker 2:I forget exactly and it completely blew my mind because there was a summer solstice event. I forget exactly and it completely blew my mind because there was a group of women there communicating with plants and doing this whole oral tradition of plant healing, just like this exists. That was like I remember driving out the driveway for the first time I was like, oh, what am I getting into? But everyone was super friendly and I learned so much. And then I went back and then I went back again. So that was the first tradition that I learned herbalism in, which is great because it gave me this hands-on you know, medicine making wildcrafting, learn directly from the plants, have a relationship with the plants and all the kind of shamanic type aspects involved making wildcrafting learn directly from the plants, have a relationship with the plants and you know, and all the kind of shamanic type aspects involved. And I did that for about 10 years. And I also hung out with traditional nurse midwives back there in Western Mass.
Speaker 2:Yeah, when I moved to Western Mass from the Cape, which was like a special class of humans, right, with amazing skills and also just this long history of using herbs in very specific contexts and really understanding the safety and the dosage and when to use what. So I followed a lot of those folks around and be like I'll dig your, I'll carry your tools, I'll dig your root for you. You know, I don't, I didn't even know there was such your tools, I'll dig your root for you. You know, I don't. I didn't even know there was such a thing as an herb school back then. Right, yeah, yeah. But I did that for a while and then I ended up moving to this.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was in Massachusetts for about 10 years doing like the village herbalist and going to some births and different stuff, had a kid and decided I needed to move to the southern appalachians because my family had a house way back in the woods up in yancey county and, um, it was empty at the time and I was like I need a place to live. So that whole relationship with those herbs and those mountains and those traditions, just really, you know that was it. Like, this is what I'm doing with my life. This is it. Um, it was just amazing. I mean, it's amazing part of the country. It's gorgeous, you know, yeah, my grandmother is from there.
Speaker 1:Oh really, yeah she. She went to finishing school in Asheville and worked at Woolworths. That was her first job, wow.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so there huh Woolworths was still open when I moved there. We used to go in there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, she, she, uh, and then she ran off to marry my grandfather and have seven children, but and then they, but they, they never strayed far from the mountains, even when he was, you know. I mean, I think that's something that gets in your soul, absolutely that kind of connection, like I can't wait to get back.
Speaker 2:I'm going on a big road trip in May and that's like the star of the road trip, oh cool. Visiting some of my old plant stands. Hopefully they survived the hurricane and you know a lot of destruction down there. Yeah, I still have a lot of friends in the area and it's just, you know, it's my other home. Really, oh nice, if I wouldn't live here, I would live there okay, all right, fair enough, right?
Speaker 1:we always have those few places that tug on our heartstrings. So when you were down there, what?
Speaker 2:was happening next. Yeah, so continued doing the wildcrafting, selling the herbal products, hanging out with the midwives, you know, and just making do plant rescues for when they were putting the highway in. Making do plant rescues for when they were putting the highway in. Worked on a organic ginseng and golden seal woods grown farm for a while, lived in a teepee. Spent some time at Joe Hollis's Mountain Gardens. Lived in a teepee there, you know, did the down home herbalist life. And then somebody suggested to me that I should go back to college Because at that point you could get grants and super cheap student loans. And you know I was a single mom with a kid. So they're like why don't you just do that? You'll get enough money to live on, you can learn more stuff and you know I thought about it. I'm like that sounds fun on, you can learn more stuff and you know, I thought about it.
Speaker 2:I'm like that sounds fun. Right, be still there. You know what I'm saying. So I enrolled at UNCA in the biology department and I was shooting for a minor in chemistry, which I missed by one class because it wasn't scheduled my last semester. So I did a lot of chemistry, a lot of biology, all the plant ID and field studies, learn how to key into a botanical key and everything. All the independent studies thing like independent research project. I made it be about herbal medicine or medicinal plants and I was the weirdo back then, right. So I graduated from there in 2000. So this is the late 90s. This is what I was doing. In the late 90s, you know, they were all like well, isn't she interesting? Except the plant physiology professor kind of got it. But at that point academia and traditional herbal medicine didn't quite know what to do with each other, you know. And that's gone a long way since then. Oh my gosh.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I was. I was the edgy one. I was that strange, eccentric but smart kid who wrote a thesis about phytolacca, pokeweed and you know all these things. But I had a great time there. I love just being able to dive into that and, you know, learn. The sciences that are behind that have really come up now to introduce modern herbalism and when I graduated I was like this is so cool. I now have this hands-on community herbalist, wise woman tradition background and this scientific education. What am, and you know, how do I put those together and what sort of herbalist am I going to make my career into? You know, and I thought about it and I'm like herbal constituents. No one is talking very much. People are starting to be curious about that, but there's not a good book out there.
Speaker 2:You know, you wrote it yeah on purpose. You know, there were like good, like pharmacognosy books, which is like what the pharmacy schools would. It's like PhD type stuff. You know, yeah, post baccalaureate stuff, there was good stuff, but it was hard to understand for people with an herbal background or maybe you hadn't studied years of chemistry and everything. So I'm like I'm gonna study all of this stuff with the help of the great jim duke. He really inspired me, james definitely an inspiration.
Speaker 2:James duke yeah, um, you know, I, I sought out. It's like who knows? You know I sought out. It's like who knows about this? You know, I sought out a few people and so I studied after I graduated.
Speaker 2:I studied that and, you know, fortunately I had the background to understand it, and then I started translating it so it would be more practical for herbalists and also so you could have an actual personal relationship with phytochemicals, right, because you can smell them, you can taste them, some of them, you can smell some of them. Well, you know this aromatherapy, right, some of them you can taste. Some of them have a particular feel like mucilages are slippery, tannins are dry. You know some of them. You can tell by the colors.
Speaker 2:So I spent a lot of time weaving together the sensory experience of herbs and how you can communicate with a plant that way, with what's behind it in the herbal constituents world and with the physiological activities of those constituents, and also how that applies to medicine making. Like, why would I tincture this herb, uh, versus make it into fire cider or drink, drink a water infusion or make a oil or a sap out of it? You know, um, because you can bring so many different kinds of medicines out of one herb, depending on how you you know what, what you make with it, how you extract it and what. That's also um chemistry behind that, like herbal chemistry behind those principles, right, because some things really come out in water well and some things need higher percent ethanol, like you know, in tinctures, and that's alcohol and um, some things really make a really good oil infusion. So learning how to put together, you know, the constituents, their solubility, their activity and all that kind of stuff, is a way to understand how to make better medicines out of plants.
Speaker 1:Also Awesome. So that's what I got fascinated with and I'm still doing it. Yeah, no, we, we always hear, uh, students always love, like, like they go and check out your stuff. After they, yeah, I'm like, hey, check out this book, you know, because your enthusiasm for your topic is contagious. I love how you mentioned the fact that a nerve can do more than one thing. So, like, I always try to like, really encourage students to like yes, you can use it this way or this way, but it's like there's more than one application, there's like more than one way to make a cake, you know, and they're like, oh, you know, like that light bulb moment when they're very beginning, and it's like echinacea for this or this is for that, and then you see that like the whole thing just like kind of explode and they're like whoa, hang on a sec.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's like you think you're going to learn an herb, you know.
Speaker 1:it's like I'm going to stay, nice try.
Speaker 2:I'll know it. And then all of a sudden this still happens. You know, oh yeah, like routinely. I'm like oh, I think I know what I'm doing, I think I know, and then I learned something new about the plant and I'm like wait I know this for 30 years. You know, because plants are so deep, they're really complex, you know, and so it totally makes sense to learn like one herb, one action at first, but you got to realize it's like, wow, that's. You know, that's herb kindergarten. It just keeps going.
Speaker 1:I love that. I'm going to have to steal that phrase, herb kindergarten, because it's it's true, it's like that's. That's like the basic worksheet. What color is this? You know basic basic worksheet, but it's. It's a lot more. Herbs are a lot more involved and complex and simple than we think you know what. I mean like it's all over the place.
Speaker 2:It's all over the place.
Speaker 1:I love that you first started with like the wise woman tradition. Um, that, you know, I did some early work with that. When you said, uh, you know you wrote a letter, I remember sending in my written homework, so I love that. But I think, think that it's important that people understand that you can be quote very scientific and write a book about constituents Right at the same time. And I think that sometimes I see different herbal approaches, that it's like all or nothing, and I'm like, oh, okay, then where do I fit in? Like so if you're listening to this and you, you love both theories, lisa is a good example of of how those things can work together.
Speaker 2:We shouldn't you know I one thing I've learned throughout my long life is, um, not to limit herbs with my own opinion. You know what I mean. I'll be like, oh, that's good for this, or I don't like this herb, or you know, that doesn't work very well, or that's amazing, or that doesn't do this or that that's the only thing for this you know I don't.
Speaker 1:I try not to do that at all anymore, because herbs continually surprise me yeah, it's like, as we have the opportunity to dig deeper, more is being uncovered. It's like an archeological site you know it really is.
Speaker 2:It's the discovery and the mystery. You know what I mean. You're just like wait, guess what I found out, and then I get all. I used to really be into archeology as a kid. So great analogy.
Speaker 1:Oh, perfect, perfect. I was really, I'm really into anthropology, so, like, for me, herbalism was just. It made sense. You would use what's around you if you were a community or whatever, so why would this not be a good thing to do? I mean, you know so, so it's. It's interesting how we can take so much from the past when, when it's convenient, and not acknowledge things from the past when it's not, and it's like, yeah, there's a reason why people use something for so long yeah, or the plant is named after the condition.
Speaker 2:You know, like you probably think a few of those like like, like, self-heal, prunella vulgaris, right, self-heal or heal, all super interesting herb, right, the German name for it. I'm not going to butcher it by trying to say it, but the German name for it is the word for infected bleeding gums or gingivitis. Oh, try to say it. Yeah, b-r-u-n-e-l or something close to that. Um, you know, and it's just like, okay, if a plant is named after a condition, there's a pretty good chance.
Speaker 1:Well, snake bite root. Um what's that? Snake bite root is like one of the names of like you know uh we always tell students to learn the latin name, because there's so many common names out there that overlap, are the same, or there's like four or five plants that carry the same common name.
Speaker 2:Yeah, besides knowing like latin names. It's like it's like you know in harry potter verse. It's like you can cast a spell with a latin name well I could talk to anyone with it.
Speaker 1:So I remember I've gone to herb markets in turkey and in egypt and and then different places in europe, and um, so I would go in and I'd just be looking around and we couldn't necessarily speak the same language I didn't know Farsi, I didn't know you know Arabic or anything like that but I could say the Latin name of the herb and we were suddenly vibing. You know, we were suddenly like OK, understanding each other and making faces and hand gestures or slight language overlap to figure out what was going on. And I think that the Latin names or the scientific names, no matter what you call them right, I think they open you up to each other herbally.
Speaker 2:That's really cool, yeah, cause it's like the lingua franca, you know, it's like that's the language. It's like, oh, we can talk about prunella, yeah, yeah, but it does help keep you straight with your species. Mean, you know, that's one of the fun things when you're first getting into herbalism too. You learn your plant identification right and, and you can get better and better and better at that your whole life. Um, but having those scientific names it like, you know, it, puts you in that realm where you're like okay, I, I am able to learn this specific plant and not confuse it with other plants which you know you don't want to make those mistakes. So, yeah, it's important and it's really cool to like.
Speaker 2:One of my favorite things about herbalism is these archaic words you get to use, right, like, like archaic medical words and, like you know, energetics, language and stuff like that, along with the Latin names. And yeah, it's just, it's a whole nother realm. It's got a lot of like kind of mystery appeal to it, you know, at the same time and it's not mutually exclusive with science. That's the thing it's like. I communicate with plants. I learned how to do that. I'll sit down and I'll listen to them and I'll engage my intuitive sense when I'm formulating for a person or something. I think that's equally legitimate stuff as the whole. Read the scientific studies, understand the chemistry, know the human physiology in detail and how they interact and got some gaseous enzymes and all the stuff. It's all you know. It's all part of being a living human in relationship with living plants.
Speaker 1:you know, absolutely I try to limit myself although I spend a lot of time. It's funny. Um, I like I love the scientific names because it helps me visualize the landscape. Too often when they talk about like alpinus or something like that, you know like, oh okay, all right. You know, like, maybe something I've never heard of before, it helps me visualize, like, where it comes from. And this, you know, I can understand the color, even if it's just reading something and I have not actually looking at it.
Speaker 2:So I love.
Speaker 1:I love that. It's a language of its own. It is it just like? Well, just like the work that you do like?
Speaker 2:yeah, yeah, that's another language that's a whole other.
Speaker 1:That's a lot of overlap fortunately.
Speaker 2:But yeah, I mean those Latin names. They all mean something. If you get like, what is there's a? There's a really cool little book I'm not remembering the name of it now but it helps you understand what Latin names mean in botany and medicine and stuff. And I mean they all. It's just a different language. They all have meanings, like you know tall spiky plant that grows near the creek, or you know what mean it's like it's not just. You know spells, not just spells, maybe a little squaterpene lactones. I always do that when I teach class constipation no more yeah, dude, get yourself a rowing wand.
Speaker 2:That's all I can say that's awesome.
Speaker 1:I love that. I love that. So what is the? What is the one of the? What is one of your biggest joys with teaching?
Speaker 2:oh, with teaching. Oh, lighting, lighting, that enthusiasm, that's the thing it's like when I'm teaching. I get so excited because plants and phytochemistry and all that stuff.
Speaker 2:It's just super interesting to share it with people who you see the light bulbs going off you know, because, like with medicine making, for example, bones going off, you know, because, like with medicine making, for example and I get to be nine years old, by the way, all right, which is like awesome. But so medicine making is an example. Like we learn first, kind of with a recipe. Say, you know, you learn from your teachers, like, do it this way, do it this way, use this much of that, use these herbs, whatever. And it's kind of recipe based approach. But we don't necessarily learn at first why we're doing it that way. Right, yeah, it's like, why did? Why is this tincture made with 50%? You know, alcohol, why is this?
Speaker 2:And then you look at tinctures in the store and you're like, why is this one 80, 85%? Why is this one 30%? Like, what is happening there? What are people doing with that, you know? And when you start asking yourself the why questions, then it opens up this whole other realm. And when you learn what's behind the why, then you have amazing skills as a medicine maker, right. So I love to teach all kinds of classes, but I try to work some kind of medicine making, constituents based medicine making thing into most of what I do and just to like watch the light bulbs go off and people, they're getting the whys behind the. You know, do this, don't do that Be like, don't use that herb with that medication, because you might have an or drug interaction right and then we go why, how does that work?
Speaker 2:learn the details and learn when it's okay to do that or what form, like can I use a tincture, can I use a tea? How much of it can I use like what? Which particular medication are we talking about? Because there's always all these details behind the things that we learn you know, yeah, and it just keeps going like we were saying forever.
Speaker 2:So I think one of my favorite things about teaching is is getting people to start asking why they're doing what they're doing, you know, and why they're doing a thing the way they're doing it. And then, once they start understanding the why behind it, it gives you a whole lot more, and this is for clinical practice too. It gives you a whole lot more insight and ability to, for example, formulate for a specific person right, Because instead of being like you know, echinacea is good for the immune system. You start learning this kind of stuff and you're like what is?
Speaker 1:it. It's good for.
Speaker 2:Tom's immune system, or like the immune system, is complicated. Let's learn about the immune system and how it works.
Speaker 1:Maybe we should review our immune system unit.
Speaker 2:I will never learn everything I want to know about the immune system.
Speaker 1:I will never learn everything I want to know about the immune system. I will never learn everything I want to know about how humans work. You know like. You know, like I always feel like I'm running really fast to play catch up with everything you know. Anytime there's a new advancement or new this or new that that I've never heard of before, I'm like, ah, I'm never going to keep up and I mean, I guess that's the beauty of our work.
Speaker 2:It always challenges us and always like makes us think that's the beauty of having a few decades of experience too, you know. So I was such a smarty pants when I was a young herbalist, like I learned a little bit, and then I thought I knew a lot and I had opinions and I was all, like you know, entranced by my opinions. And now that I'm like just about 65, I have this perspective and I'm like, oh, now I have a sense of like I know a lot more stuff. But I also know that, you know, there's so much I don't know and that I could still learn. That'll make me a better herbalist and that gives me a lot of respect for my herbal elders. You know, you hear this stuff. It's like respect your elders.
Speaker 2:When you're a young person, you're like which ones I think they're all a bunch of? They't even know how to, how to work a phone, I mean. But, um, you know, it's like the herbal elders who've been practicing for 30, 40, 50 years. Those people have insights, you know, and that are just valuable you can't get anywhere else. Like Paul Berdner was my you know, is my um herbal elder that I learned so much about clinical herbalism, vitalist herbalism, I mean, he's a science nerd too, you know um, but just that whole vitalist practices thing and the importance of the food and like form, the, the diet is specific to the person and the herbal formula is for the person. It's not just like this herb is good for migraines and it goes like that's the vitalist tradition right. It goes way deeper than that and you start looking at conditions or diseases and actual um symptoms that the body is communicating. Something underlying is going wrong.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, the body's finding a way to talk to you, right, or to talk to whoever's working with them. No, it's really interesting how we definitely. I find that herbalism is one career where you definitely can grow into it long term. So, like some careers, like it's like you get a certain age and it's like certain things are just too different or things change too much, but herbalism, I think, keeps challenging you. The longer you're in, the more exciting it becomes. The more you learn, the more you let go of, the more you understand. I know nothing.
Speaker 2:I literally teach students and they're like but I'm supposed to be the teacher yeah, well, you know, students will be like well, what about this for this?
Speaker 1:and I'm like well, it's a little bit more complex than that, you know. It's like it's yes, you can, but we can also do this. We can also look at this like why aren't we looking at that?
Speaker 2:And then there's like oh, okay, you know what that brings up. That's like a huge thing, because, even as a practicing, even as an experienced practicing herbalist, like people will come up to you in the farmer's market or whatever and they'll be like what's good for eczema? And they'll show you their eczema and you're like, oh, how do I approach this? I'll show you the X and Y and you're like, oh, how do I approach this? Because most of us in this, in our culture, have been trained in allopathic thinking. Right, Take this to make that go away, this for that.
Speaker 2:And then you know, we have whatever experiences we have with pharmaceuticals that make us want some alternatives. And so in the allopathic mindset, we're like, oh I, this drug really didn't do it for me for whatever reason. Maybe there's an herb that I could use instead. Yeah, right. So then we go into allopathic herbalism, which is a good place to start, but don't get stuck there, right? Because, like you just said, it goes deeper, deeper, deeper. And you know, and you can there's nothing wrong with doing harm reduction too. And that's like, oh, I have a pounding headache, Is there an herb I could take for that? And you come up with something and they feel better. But we're always having. As herbalists, we're always having to tell people it's like look, we need to find the origins of the condition.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a long-term commitment. It's not just I mean, yeah, there are some things, you're right, there's some things you A for B and things are taken care of, yeah, and that's great. I always tell my students, like that's acute herbalism, right, like got to cut that, or. But like when we're working with clients, it's like one of the first jobs you have as a clinician is to let the client know this is a long term relationship between the two of us. This is not a way for me to keep making money off of you. This is this, is this, is you having to follow through to like your part of this? You having to follow through to like your part of this? And I think it's so empowering for our clients to feel like they're part of that right?
Speaker 2:Yeah, because it's like the original meaning of the word. You know we're not allowed to call ourselves doctors and this is illegal, but the original meaning of the word doctor is teacher. Latin meaning meaning it means the teacher, and so I see the herbalist role as like helping the person to understand what's going on, you know, especially with chronic conditions, what's going on with their body and where's the some of the roots of these conditions are, and it's going to be individualized right and start empowering, you know, supporting them and empowering them to make changes that are going to let the wisdom of the body self correct some of these conditions. You know he knows how to heal. That's built in. Oh yeah, I mean we. It's like some figuring that out and figuring where your herbal support or your herbal nudges of.
Speaker 1:Simon Mills would say, like just nudge that process and watch it rebalance I always say it's like putting in a lego block, yeah, you know, like just filling in the missing piece, like building, you know, working off of the foundation and adding in the blocks that keep everything stable, because the body will say you know, it's like when you talk, when you work with little kids, right, you can tell them close your eyes, imagine that you've got a sword and you're killing the germ bugs, right, or whatever. This is like what we used to do. My boys were into knights, right.
Speaker 1:They went through their phase where they're really into knights right.
Speaker 2:So it's like you're going to be like God.
Speaker 1:You're in battle and la la la, and that's your body taking care of itself, and I swear they still do this to this day. They may not admit it. But I think like they know their body. Will you know? They've learned to trust that thing, and I think we're taught not to trust our ability. Oh, oh right.
Speaker 2:I mean that's a huge gap in American education. You don't learn how your body works and you don't learn how money works.
Speaker 1:Yeah, right.
Speaker 2:I don't know if you know anything about me, but I teach.
Speaker 1:I teach courses just for the money part Like yeah. You know because we're deficient in those areas.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and and that, and that goes back to what the wise woman tradition teaches. It's like learn your body, go within, you know, establish, like, what is your liver telling you by doing this, you know, because, I mean, we, we tend to. That's another like a bit of a thing that I think allopathic medicine could improve on is a lot of times they think the protocols, you know, are gold standard of treatment. It's like you have this named disease entity. You have it somewhere, you got it. You know you have eczema. Eczema must be on my mind today. Here is the treatment approved, you know, by the insurance company will pay for it or whatever. Here's the standard treatment for that condition. And it doesn't really work that way Because, you know, while people with eczema will have some things in common, they will also be different, oh yeah, and it can have a different set of causes in different people, and different people can respond to herbs differently too.
Speaker 2:That's a relationship, you know a person and an herb are in relationship. It's not going to be the same, you know. It's like think about yourself, like in your grandma, like that relationship, be yourself and like your exciting new boyfriend, girlfriend, whatever, friend, like you're a different person in those different relationships. Yeah, and that happens between herbs and people too. So absolutely yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, it's really interesting. Like, even if you have two people who have the same, we'll use eczema, eczema trigger, right, they both are allergic to some laundry detergent. We'll say, right, Cause that's a common one. If you work with children, right, and they could come, they could come to you. It could look exactly the same, the trigger is exactly the same and the treatments are completely different because of who that person is, what they eat, what they're exposed to, what their stress is like, what kind of water they use to bathe with. I mean, like we just we forget that everything that is of the most success in our country and I'll save the world when it comes to healing is when we have a personalized approach. Absolutely, but in our country, the personalized approach is really the gold standard. Like you were saying, oh, here's the gold standard approach, which is we give you this protocol A, B or C and this is what's going to work and it, and we can sell that like it's personalized, but there's no person in it.
Speaker 2:You know what I mean Like it's just a handout.
Speaker 1:Here's what you use.
Speaker 2:And the personal. It's like diagnostic tests prescription next you know and I feel bad.
Speaker 1:I'll be honest with you I feel bad for physicians. I wouldn't want someone telling me I can only spend 15 minutes with a patient. That's crazy.
Speaker 2:You can't get anything done. The doctor's fault, because that's the system. But a lot of them are ditching the system too.
Speaker 1:You see their Instagram reels, nuts.
Speaker 2:You see their Instagram reels. Yeah, you know I think medicine is evolving. Every big system has inertia, you know. It's like dragging along, getting gradually more messed up, but it's also evolving at the same time. And that's where I get really excited, because I work with pharmacists, naturopathic physicians, functional medicine doctors, like people, health care professionals of various kinds, because they've been trained in the chemistry and the physiology language. So they have this background where we have we have a common understanding and a common language, language, right, and then we go off into the things we've been talking about.
Speaker 2:You know the individual. You know action, response, things that people have a relationship with herbs and the intuitive approach and plant spirit, medicine and all this stuff. And some of them aren't quite ready for that and some of them just like fully embrace it and they're like like, wow, the world just got so more multifaceted and amazing, you know. But, um, I really love working with health care professionals because the ones who are curious about is there more, like what's going on?
Speaker 2:Those are the kind of people that come and take my, take my online classes or come to workshops and lectures and stuff. So I do spend and we get to use the word, the nerdy constituent words and you know the fun equipment and all the things. So I have a. I have a really good time with that too, but like any kind of herbalist. So here's the thing with what I do like a lot of people think herbal chemistry is just this hard, gnarly, esoteric, you know thing that they're just like. I don't even want to learn that, you know, because that's kind of what you got in school with chemistry.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, it was like learning a foreign language, right language right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, with math it's like if you have a, you know, if math isn't your favorite topic, that makes it harder. But, um, a lot of people, so we've and and it's just like man. My organic chemistry teacher was so bad. I mean, bless his heart. He was like super fast, like super conventional guy, ready to retire, and that class was the biggest challenge because I was super excited about. I'm like, oh, organic chemistry. I did my general chem and everything, so that was a wrangle, but it did teach me a lot of important skills like how to draw chemical structures and write without looking down at your paper. You know things like that, yeah. But you know, when I graduated, I got like all these awards and chemistry and stuff. And when I graduated he was like I've got a entry level position for you, making 60,000 bucks a year. This was in 2000 at this pharmaceutical company. Do you want it? And I was like, oh, that's a temptation, having been like a broke student for the last.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, what a flattering like thing to have someone offer you.
Speaker 2:I know I was really touched too and I'm just like you, sweet old super conventional difficult chemistry teacher, you, I really appreciate that but I'm going in a different way.
Speaker 2:But yeah, you know and and and it was like that. So so the way chemistry is taught academically, basically the point of it is to get you ready to like work in, you know, creating molecules, or work in industry, or work in pharmaceuticals, or you know the careers, the standard American careers, and I think, certain kinds of people really. That really works for them. But it turns a lot of like nature oriented people off. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Unfortunately Right, because it could be something really exciting.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's my goal is to make like. This is one of my missions in life. It's like plants make these phytochemicals. It's not a laboratory thing. You know, they make them. Plants do that. They create this stuff on purpose.
Speaker 2:On their own. Yeah, and plants are master pharmacists, like I mean, think about a plant. Right, it's out there growing and all of a sudden, like some hail comes along and it has to deal with that. Or the grasshoppers show up. It has to deal with that. Or the sun gets really hot, or it dries out, or it's super wet. It's like they can't get up and go inside because they're rooted, you know. Yeah, so they have to deal with stuff by their, by their phytochemical genius. Yeah, so they make more of this. They drive the grasshopper away with some volatile compound, if they're lucky we had a bad grasshopper year last year.
Speaker 2:Um, you know, they make more anthocyanins. If the sun is too hot, they change the way they're handling water, you know. So they've come up with ways to use constituents or phytochemicals to, you know, deal with as their army. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I'm sorry I missed the last word.
Speaker 1:Oh, I said like as their army, yeah, yeah, you. I'm sorry I missed the last word. Oh, I said like as their army, yeah, yeah, you know, they just you know, it's their own apothecary.
Speaker 2:Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1:I'll make this.
Speaker 2:I'll make that. You know, and I think we can have an influence on that. This is a shamanic thing, right? Because that phenomenon where plants make different phytochemicals for their needs that you end up having plants with and you know this from aromatherapy, right, you can have really different things going on in the same species of a plant according to what the plant is up to. But if you also establish a way to communicate with a plant and I think this is like my understanding of what a very, very old universal practice is you know, the herbalist or the medicine person, the shaman communicates with the plant before they harvest it and ask the plant to make really good medicine for what they're going to do with the plant, right, yeah, I came up with a term for that. I call that responsive variability. Oh, I love that. I love that To the healer, the herbalist.
Speaker 1:You should write a book on that. I know, like you know practices to help people, because a lot of people they have a hard time tapping into this stuff. Even if they do all the moves, they still have a hard time breaking through that inside. You know, we work with students sometimes who are like, yeah, no, I get it, I understand, but like they need the trigger to help them open up their doors.
Speaker 2:Right, so something like that could be awesome.
Speaker 1:You could do like a workbook or something.
Speaker 2:Well, so that's like a workshop we do out here. Oh cool.
Speaker 1:How do people get find your website and your website?
Speaker 2:So we have two websites. One of them is focusing on the herbal constituent stuff and it's called herbalconstituentscom. Right, and there's different levels of nerdiness in there, but it's basically for you know an herbalist that's had herbalism 101, you know, okay, like you've learned these things, or you know, maybe a healthcare professional, we get a lot of nurses coming in now, which is super interesting.
Speaker 1:We do too, I love that right, it's a whole shift.
Speaker 2:I'm just blown away by nurses, you know. So it'll be like somebody who's like, okay, I went to, I went to herb school, I've got a good foundation in herbs, you know. Or I've done my couple of herb programs. And or people who have done a lot of medicine making right. Or health professionals who are like, okay, you know, I understand, you know the principles, I want to learn the herbs. So that's what most of the herbal constituents type stuff I have all kinds of classes there and we started a new thing actually, which is super exciting, um, which is what I was working on this stuff for it's a membership community.
Speaker 2:This is called phytosapiens oh cool my friend gave a little of that. I love that grace, thank you. Um, yeah, but that's for like, that's the next step of nerdiness. That's like, oh, you like this herbal constituents intro that you took because I like herbal constituents intro course and then I have like a two semester course if you really want to go into it. Um, so people have done either one of those you know, depending on the background. I'm like, okay, let's really nerd out with the uh. So we just are in our second month of that. Um, and that's super fun because I can just unleash, you know, my phytochemistry nerd and do a bunch of research and learn new things about herbs that I thought I knew. Yeah, can I give you an example of that? Because this brings the worlds together.
Speaker 2:Nerd, and do a bunch of research and learn new things about herbs that I thought I knew. Can I give you an example of that? Because this brings the worlds together. Okay, so earlier, when you were talking about, you know this is good for that and you've got formulas that generally work for everybody. And so for like a UTI, like a urinary tract infection, like an uncomplicated one, you know, over and over and over again, I learned this from the traditional midwife herbalist. Those are kind of easy to get rid of, like the occasional urinary tract infection, you know. If it keeps coming back over and over again, that's telling about underlying stuff, but in just a simple UTI, all the time we would put this formula or variations of this formula together for people, and almost every single time it works Right, and we would put uva, ursi and yarrow and echinacea, right.
Speaker 2:But one of the things we always put in it was marshmallow root. You know, I still do, and you know a lot of us have learned that marshmallow root is mucilaginous, it's a demulcent, it's cooling, it's soothing, it's just like really gentle, supportive herb for the mucous membranes which are also in the bladder and the urethra. Right, and you put all those together and it just like almost always works, you know. And so I was like, yeah, great Demolson.
Speaker 2:And then I was doing some research for this phytosapiens thing and we're like what you know we do, constituents of the month, herbs of the month in the lab, live webinar, that's like our weekly thing. And so I was like which constituents of the month should we start out with? And I was all fascinated with medicinal mushrooms and they have like polysaccharide, right, immunomodulating polysaccharides says that up there, um, and echinacea has immunomodulating polysaccharides etc. So a, so a lot of the herbs used to deal with, you know, the set of winter woes, the respiratory conditions and et cetera. So I was like let's do immunomodulating polysaccharides, that'll be fun. So I started researching it right, and I got I knew that like marshmallow had some of those and, as part of the mucilage, right usually the complex mixture stuff.
Speaker 2:So I started looking at. I'm like I wonder if there have been any scientific studies published on this recently, because, like, oh man, scientific research on herbs is just on fire around the world right now very, very encouraging. So there's new papers coming out all the time. So I went and looked and like there was like, and then one of them was like immunostimulant activities of marshmallow root and I'm like we did the let me learn about this. And so I got into that and I was like that makes so much sense. You know, I kind of heard of that before. I didn't know it in depth, but I read some of these papers and I'm like that makes so much sense in that UTI formula. Oh yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so it's not just a cooling, soothing demulcent. It's an immunostimulant too, so it helps you kill those bacteria that have gotten into the bladder. Yeah, oh, I love that. I love that.
Speaker 1:I know I'm still like so you're gonna have fun teaching this class too. From the looks of it, so you're gonna have fun teaching that class too, because you get to learn more.
Speaker 2:I know. Well, that's like what do I almost know about? That's what I need to study so that I could teach people. And then another thing I learned from that was that, like you know, inulin right. Like burdock root inulin that feeds your good gut microbes and that just helps everything like everything yeah.
Speaker 2:So a lot of times we learn burdock root as an excellent source of inulin right, helps balance blood sugar too. And dandelion root that inulin was my friend since the beginning, right? I did not realize there's a bunch of inulin in echinacea root oh, yeah, yeah right, yeah, so you know, echinacea root has those tingly buzzy that you get. They're called alchemides. You get them in tinctures and they are both immune modulators and anti-inflammatory constituents Perfect for that formula we were talking about.
Speaker 2:I know right. And then the water extract of the echinacea root. You get immunomodulating polysaccharides. That herb is really famous for those. But you also get all these inulins right which feed the gut microbes. But then I go down in there and it's like, guess what inulins are also build the immune system, they don't just feed the gut microbes. So now they're immunomodulating polysaccharides to, you know, and I'm just like echinacea, you know. And then and then I I was like how do you get a really great concentration of inulins and polysaccharides out of echinacea root? Oh, you decoct it just like we learned in herb school echinacea root decoction and then squirt your teeth in and you've got like you know.
Speaker 2:So that was super exciting putting all those different pieces together when I was um working on the last phytosapien stuff oh, I love that.
Speaker 1:And so what is the other website they can find you at?
Speaker 2:so that's our farm, um, elderberriesfarmcom, and it's it's r-r-y-s, with no apostrophe, because you can't put the apostrophe yeah, but, um, I did it that way because I dedicated this farm to the elderberry. I'm like I don't really entirely believe in like landowning, even though I'm a landowner, because I don't think humans can actually own Mother Earth, you know, but that's the game that we play in America. So I was like, let me say that this farm belongs to Elderberry. Oh cool, I love that Farmcom. Yeah, and you know, an elderberry bush actually welcomed me to this area. And you know, an elderberry bush actually welcomed me to this area, which was another amazing thing. I'm like, look at you, but so we're in what we call the North Fork Valley of the Gunnison River. North Fork of the Gunnison River, it's the western slope of Colorado, yeah, so you know, a lot of people know where aspen is, for example, and it's like aspen is over that way, about 40 miles, but you can't get there from here as the crow flies, yeah.
Speaker 2:So you go to the mountains, the valleys. You know it takes. It takes about two and a half hours to get to aspen, but so we're. We're in that part of colorado where it's super mountainous off to the east, but then the desert, deserty part starts to the west of us oh beautiful, which is cool. So we're in this transitional zone where we get snow, melt, irrigation, and then it's like hot in the summer and kind of cold, but not that cold in the winter, and it's a really interesting place to have an herb farm.
Speaker 2:Oh, it sounds like it. Yeah, because some things are like yes, and they grow like mad and other things are like I don't think so.
Speaker 1:I was about to make that same voice. I think our attitude plants are related or something oh that's hysterical.
Speaker 2:What's really funny is I got pokeweed to grow here.
Speaker 1:Oh wow, I can't stop pokeweed from growing where I am.
Speaker 2:It's not even supposed to be able to grow here. It's not on like the zone list, you know. But we work that out. So, um, but you, you get this combination of, like western bioregional herbs, like you know, like michael moore, you know type herbs, but also these like mountainous, you know herbs will grow here. It's nothing like the appalachian, it's totally different.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, I would imagine actually wow, how exciting. So where can people get your book? Oh, they can buy it. You know what?
Speaker 2:oh, they get it directly from you or you don't have to buy it from the devil okay, although the devil moves a lot of books, but you can get it from lulucom that's my printer publisher. L-u-l-ucom is the best way to buy it. And then I learned about this new online bookstore. I put a thing up on my socials about it and now I'm blanking on it because I got it from someone else. I literally forget the name of it, but it's really cool because they're an indie bookseller and they give like 10 or 15 percent of all their sales back to actual independent bookstores. Oh, that's cool, which is yeah, they're not.
Speaker 1:Powell's, is it? Powell's is the big one and out West Powell's no Okay.
Speaker 2:Cause I know they're a big independent bookstore, but that's really. That's really cool If people go see my Facebook or whatever.
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah, yeah. So people go look at her space book and find that bookstore.
Speaker 2:Yeah, cause I just I just ordered a bunch of books from them. Yay, I like my money to go to good supportive. You know, actual people instead of large.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we, I'm, I'm like famous for that, like to the point I think it probably drives people crazy. Well, I mean, I just don't like. I like to buy stuff from my neighbors, for sure you know really what we do here.
Speaker 2:We're like we need some chickens. We go over there. Do you guys have any bacon? Like that's what I love about this valley this is the highest concentration of organic agriculture in Colorado. That's so awesome. It's so awesome. And we have orchards vineyards, oh wow. And we have orchards, vineyards, orchards, vineyards, herb farms, flower farms, vegetable farms, heritage livestock farms, yak ranches. I mean I love it. It's wild out here, like there's a gold medal trout stream right over the hills. You know, I love that. You know I love that. So it's. This valley is very into producing its own food and medicine and regenerative agriculture is like the hot topic right now and lots of really good colorado cannabis is grown here cannabis and hemp.
Speaker 1:So it's like all about plants yeah, for real right, that is so exciting. I'm really like we're really into well, we've raised almost all of our own food, um, but also just like uh, I just love the idea of supporting other people who are in this journey. From you know who I buy my dishes. From you know who who who makes my clothing. Like. I really like thinking about things a little bit differently to.
Speaker 2:I think it's more important right, because it's part of the community too. Yeah, and we trade. We do a lot of trading here also.
Speaker 1:Oh cool.
Speaker 2:That's awesome. We traded for a pile of firewoods and consultations, you know, or whatever. Traded for a pile of firewoods and consultations, you know, or whatever. Because I think like a locally strong, local economy and a strong community, and even like the economic aspect of that is super important, yeah, and I think it makes you become one with people.
Speaker 1:Maybe you don't always come into contact with oh yeah, you know like contact with oh yeah, you know, like, oh they're you know we, our paths would never cross, except for at the farmer's market, yeah, and then we become friends and then we get to know each other and then we care about each other's. You know things, even if we're like we have nothing else in common but this, there's always that uniter, that, and I think that makes community strong. So I love that you have that.
Speaker 2:That's beautiful, I mean farmers markets are kind of key. You know what I'm saying. Like, yeah, I go in town, I go to the farmer's market, I buy a few veggies and whatever. Mostly I go to socialize, you know yeah, no, a hundred percent.
Speaker 1:It's a great way to get to know people and see what's going on, what what people are looking for and there's at least two and sometimes three herbalists at our teeny little town farmer's market.
Speaker 2:You know it's like, hey, what's up? What have you been doing lately? Try this, you know. Yeah, oh, cool, important, community, community building event for sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah well, thank you. Speaking community. Thank you so much for being here today. I really appreciate it. I will let you know when we have everything up, because I think the students are going to be so excited to see this with you. So thank you so much for being here. I appreciate you so much and I just thank you. Well, thanks for having me on. It's been great, absolutely.
Speaker 2:And I look forward to talking to you again for having me on.
Speaker 1:It's been great, absolutely, and I look forward to talking to you again soon. Thanks, and have a great day, you too. Bye, bye.
