EP5: Herbal Wisdom: Stephen Horn on Holistic Healing

Join us for an enlightening conversation with Stephen Horn, a seasoned herbalist with four decades of experience in natural healing. Stephen shares his inspiring journey into herbal remedies, discussing the limitations of modern medicine and the profound benefits of a holistic approach to health. Dive deep into topics such as the germ vs. terrain theory, the critical role of antibiotics, and the interconnectedness of physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual well-being. Discover the power of plants in addressing various health aspects, and learn about the importance of prayer, intuition, and belief in the healing process. This episode emphasizes individual empowerment and self-trust in seeking health solutions, making it a must-listen for anyone interested in holistic wellness and natural remedies.

Episode Transcript

(00:01):
All right, good morning.
We are with today.
Today we're with Stephen Horn andherbalists that I have followed for quite
some time.
But the reality is, is that, you know, Idon't know a ton about Stephen's
background.
I know that he has probably one of thebest newsletters in the herbal world that
I look forward to getting every week or sowhenever something comes out and it's

(00:23):
always a really great read.
So Stephen, thank you for being heretoday.
And we got some really fun topics to diveinto, but yeah, let's just start with kind
of your history.
Yeah.
Well, thank you for having me.
I, I've been involved pretty much fulltime in this business since the early
1980s.
So that's like 40 years.

(00:45):
but before that, what got me interested isI was actually studying outdoor survival.
well, I actually put it a different way.
I was working on my nature merit badge tobecome an Eagle Scout.
And, I.
decided to study herbs and rocks and soilsbecause I figured they wouldn't run away
while you were trying to look up what theywere in the book.

(01:06):
And I became fascinated with edible andmedicinal plants.
And so after about a year of just gettingreally into Native American lore and the
whole kind of outdoor survival thing, Ihad a spiritual experience in which I...
had this profound kind of understandingthat the creator had placed all these

(01:30):
remedies on the earth for us to use.
They were here and they were free foreveryone and that I just needed to learn
about it.
So I spent a lot of my teen years when Iwas out hiking and camping and whatever
with a field guide in hand looking upplants and trying to learn botany.
And so that hobby of mine merged with mycommunications background.

(01:52):
And so I basically used my...
writing and speaking ability to teachpeople about herbal remedies and which
I've been doing pretty much like it's afull time since for the last 40 years.
So, Wow.
That's amazing.
So where are you located?
I mean, obviously you're kind of in somenatural areas from what it sounds like.

(02:15):
Where, where was this taking place?
Well, I grew up in a Salt Lake city.
So it was in the mountains of NorthernUtah where I was learning all this stuff.
And then I actually went to work for amajor herb company for a few years and
started an educational program for them.
And then I went independent and began todo that.
I also have been involved with theAmerican Herbalist Guild.

(02:36):
I was on their board for four years.
I was president for four years.
And I also have been involved with theInternational Iridology Practitioners
Association.
I've been on their board as well.
And so I've been involved in thiscommunity trying to help promote natural
healing in general.
because from a more personal point ofview, I grew up with a lot of health

(03:01):
problems.
I had chronic sinus problems and with themedical treatments, they just seemed to
get worse.
At one point, the family doctor we had,which he was a good man, I'm not faulting
him, but he put me on antibiotics for anentire year to get rid of my chronic sinus

(03:24):
problems.
And at the end of the year, my sinusproblems were worse than when they
started.
And it wasn't until I started to actuallytry to apply some of this information I'd
learned in my teens, changing my diet andtrying some herbal remedies and going to a
chiropractor, that I actually started toget feeling better.

(03:46):
And then I started using this with myfamily, with my kids.
And it was a little scary at firstbecause, you know,
one thing to experiment on yourself,another thing when it's your children.
But I actually found that I could get mykids well faster than I could by taking
them to the doctor.
So my kids grew up with pretty much nevertaking antibiotics or having any of those

(04:10):
things because I treated all their colds,earaches, sore throats and everything with
natural remedies.
And I found they worked really, reallywell.
And also my parents were elderly, I guess.
I hate to say that because I'm...
I'm as old as my parents, older than myparents were when I started with this.
But they told me towards the end of theirlife that they were so grateful because

(04:35):
all of their friends, their seniorfriends, were on at least five different
drugs and all of them seemed to be awareand they weren't taking drugs.
They were taking herbs and nutritionalsupplements and they felt like they were
doing much better because of it.
And so I really think that there's a lack.
of education about what natural remediescan do.

(04:59):
And my personal belief is this, there aretimes when medicine is necessary, when
modern medicine is necessary.
But for most ordinary ailments and alsofor most chronic ailments for which there
is no effective treatment, the best thingto do is to start out with natural
remedies.

(05:19):
Change your diet, do some body work, getsome exercise.
take some herbs, take some nutritionalsupplements, experiment with things,
they're not going to hurt you.
They're not going to kill you.
If you have a reaction to somethingbecause it just doesn't agree with your
body, stop taking it and it goes away in aday or two.
And you'll find that you probably will bebetter.

(05:41):
And then if you do need to go to a doctor,go to a doctor.
So.
Yeah, definitely.
I recently was at a
a little small conference and it was quitefunny because it almost seemed like one of
the speakers that it kind of eventuallycame across subtly is like one of the main

(06:02):
reasons to have children is to have testsubjects.
And at the same time, I think that'sactually especially when working with
children, that's like one of the biggestfear areas for most people, right?
It's like,
And you see this with fever phobia.
No one knows how to work with feveranymore.

(06:22):
It's just immediately, you know, alarmsevery, you know, freak out.
We don't know what to do.
Take them to the ER immediately type ofmentality.
Yeah, it's like I see people and theirchild is running a fever of 101 and
they're all concerned and they want to,you know, give them something to bring
down the fever.
And I'm going, no, no, no, no, no.
Look, a fever of 101 is just your immunesystem.

(06:47):
fighting the infection.
It is actually by elevating thetemperature, it inhibits the replication
of viruses, which allows your immunesystem to have some space to build up
antibodies to fight the infection.
So when you're doing these things tosuppress the symptoms like the fever,

(07:08):
you're actually interfering with what thebody is trying to do to get well.
And that was the biggest discovery I made,by the way, in terms of
what altered my entire paradigm.
It wasn't just using herbs, it wasrealizing that particularly in acute
illness, the symptoms of coughing,sneezing, runny nose, fever, diarrhea,

(07:32):
whatever, are all actually responses ofthe immune system to the infection.
The infection isn't causing thosesymptoms.
The immune system is causing thosesymptoms.
and that what we needed to do was tosupport what the body was trying to do to

(07:52):
fight the infection.
So you got a fever, put your child in awarm bath, okay, to help the body with the
warm temperature.
And once you get the sweat glands open andthe kid starts to perspire a little bit,
the fever will break.

(08:12):
Also, if you clear the bowel, the feverwill break.
And the medical doctor I referred tobefore, he was a distant relative on my
family tree, Dr.
Wyman Merrill Horne.
He told my mom once, he said, people don'tknow home remedies anymore.
He says, I've been out to see people whoare sicker than I, when I was sicker than

(08:36):
they were.
And I think it's a big problem that mostpeople just don't know any home remedies.
And like you say, they're terrified.
of trying this stuff on their kids whenit's really not that serious or dangerous.
I mean, yeah, if you got a fever runningone off up and run a four one or five,
then yeah, you've got a an issue that youneed to take care of because then it

(08:58):
starts to cause damage to the nervoussystem.
But one on one, you know, 100 even one ortwo, it's nothing.
It's just and and the runny nose isn'tgoing to kill you the you know, and none
of that, you know, and
And so it's just symptomatic relief.
And that's the main thing that we'reoffering in modern medicine is symptomatic

(09:19):
relief.
That's true for chronic illness as well.
It's basically just doing something toease whatever the symptoms are.
No one asks, like even with adult stuff,someone has high blood pressure.
You put them on a medication to lower theblood pressure.
The question you want to know is why isthe body elevating the blood pressure?

(09:41):
What is obstructing circulation and how dowe help the circulation to be normal?
And I can tell you right now, it's acouple of very common causes of moderate
high blood pressure, stress, magnesiumdeficiency, dehydration, and there's also

(10:04):
some emotional things associated with highblood pressure too, of just unresolved
grief and emotional pain that's causingthe person to just be.
close down emotionally and you fix thosethings and the blood pressure comes down
normally automatically and you don't needany medications.
But that is that is permanently curing theperson and there's not as much money to be

(10:28):
made in curing people as there is intreating people.
Because if you're going to be on a highblood pressure medication for the rest of
your life to try to manage your high bloodpressure, that's very profitable.
Yeah, you got a new subscriber, a lifetimesubscriber, lifetime subscriber.
And then like said, like the, the, and Isee it now that I'm older, the people who

(10:51):
are like on five or 10 different drugmedications at my age, I turned 70 in
June.
You it all it's not making them well.
Anytime I've seen someone like that,they're, they're not healthy.
Sometimes I see someone and maybe they'retaking a little bit of a high blood

(11:13):
pressure medication, but most of whatthey're doing is they're trying to eat
right, they're trying to live a healthylife, and they're in much better shape
than the people who are on a whole bunchof medications.
What are your thoughts on, because I thinkone of the, at some point this is going to
finally rear its...

(11:36):
I'm not going to call it an ugly head, butit's interesting head.
Whereas as of right now, the vast majorityof people, when they think about the
issues with modern biomedical medicine,right?
One is it's like the blame is put on thesystem and the insurance companies, or
it's put on typically capitalism.

(11:58):
Whereas one thing that I've been trying toget people to understand is that actually
it's not as simple as that.
Because if you took...
the reductionist model, let's say that youjust gave all the scientists the potential
money that they might want to do theirresearch.
And you took out the manipulation ofcapitalism from the equation.

(12:20):
My point to them is that those scientistswould still use the same methodologies.
It would still be symptomatic andreductionistic to a degree.
What are your thoughts on that?
Well, yeah, because what the
Like I say, the biggest discovery I madewas not just switching from, you know,
medical, you know, pharmaceuticals toherbs and other natural remedies.

(12:44):
It was a paradigm shift in understandingthe difference between treating the effect
and trying to identify and remove thecause.
And unfortunately, when we talk about, youknow, there is this like tendency to like
look at capitalism.
I don't like.
the term capitalism because it's tied into me with banking and loans and interest

(13:06):
and all that.
But free market, free market and as peoplefreely trading goods and services.
We don't have a free market healthcaresystem.
We don't.
It is heavily basically skewed towardsthat reductionistic medical model.

(13:29):
If you go back,
little over 100 years, there were a wholebunch of different kinds of physicians in
the United States.
There were homeopaths, there werenaturopaths, the chiropractic movement was
born.
But the biggest movement was eclectics.
And the eclectics were the most populardoctors in the late 1990s, early 1900s, up

(13:52):
until around the time of 1920.
And they said, we'll use whatever works.
herbs, homeopathy, drugs, surgery,whatever we find is of most benefit to the
patient, we're going to do that.
And they were the most popular school ofmedicine.

(14:13):
So it was actually John D.
Rockefeller, who didn't like competition,who didn't like the free market, who liked
monopolies, who funded the Flexner reportto go out and say, the situation in
America of medicine is horrible.
And we'll pump huge amounts of money intopeople who will only teach the use of

(14:33):
pharmaceutical drugs.
And they manage to create a negative legalenvironment for these other alternative
practices.
So one of the things I'm really big on isI would like to see a restoration of more
free market principles in healthcare.
Why should someone who is using non -toxicbotanicals, for instance, or doing foot

(14:57):
reflexology?
Okay.
half to risk being charged with practicingmedicine without a license when that is
not by definition what modern medicine is.
Right.
as long as they're not doing harm andthey're not telling people not to go seek

(15:18):
medical help.
Why not?
In fact, there was a study done and Ithink it was, I can't remember which state
it was where, where.
there was a case that came up and they dida study and they found out that generally
speaking, all this stuff was harmless, itnever caused a thing and they actually
created what was called the Safe HarborBill, which basically, and these have been

(15:44):
passed in a number of states where youcan, as long as you disclose your
credentials and you don't make wild claimsabout curing disease or whatever, you're
free to do these things.
But there's always this push from thepharmaceutical industry to, you know,

(16:04):
inhibit the information.
I mean, this is, I've lived through thisbasically being told I cannot publish a
book that lists a particular company'sproducts.
And that's not the FDA.
That's the FTC.
Okay.
That, that I, as a third independentparty, I'm not allowed to talk about some.

(16:25):
company's products without the threat ofbeing sued.
So, you know, I don't blame the freemarket principle for this.
The competition or people being able tochoose what they think is in their own
best interest, but people think, well,that's dangerous.

(16:48):
Okay.
But if Iatric genetic disease is the sixthleading cause of death, then tell me how
an enforced monopoly for
for pharmaceutical medicine is doing us,is worse.
Right, there's, I think a very bigunderlying theme in our culture that most

(17:11):
people aren't conscious of is that we'vebeen infantilized as a culture.
Exactly, like we're not allowed to beadults.
We're not allowed to be adults and makerational adult decisions.
And the problem is, is that we put ourtrust in this idea that,
we're okay because this FDA or whatever islooking out for us, but all those agencies

(17:34):
that are quote unquote looking out for usare all staffed by people from the
industries they're policing.
Okay, so how do you, how is that safe?
In fact, you know, it's just a, it's oneof the problems that really basically is a
big issue for me because, you know, I,

(17:55):
I have to be extremely careful about whatI say, extremely careful about who I talk
to, and et cetera.
And I feel there's this constant desire towant to suppress people like me.
And we especially saw it a few years ago,where anybody who tried to give any
information about enhancing the immunesystem to help reduce your risk of viral
disease or whatever was censored for,quote unquote, false information, even

(18:19):
though all of that is extremely welldocumented in scientific literature.
So, so something here is really a misswith the way this system is working by,
because even our freedom to speak and,and, and, you know, put out information is

(18:40):
suppressed.
And I, I just, I, it's, it is an issue forme that I, I don't know.
You can tell how passionate I am aboutthis whole thing, but yeah.
Yeah.
No, I imagine.
I mean, I think for, for people who are.
prominent in this space who are releasingbooks and are you know very much in the
community as leaders it must beextraordinarily difficult, you know, I

(19:04):
don't run into that myself as much becauseyou know, I'm just you know a community
herbalist and with friends family andpeople in my real proximity But if I was
putting a mass amount of information outthen yeah, it's it's a very tricky
landscape and so I can imagine how
Yeah, it's frustrating, right?
Because it's deeper than it just goes sodeep, right?

(19:28):
It really all of this, you know, evenbeyond education is like this information
was fundamental to culture throughout allof history, right?
It was in all of our lineages and thatroute has been severed.
And we're trying to reclaim that route.
But it's
It's, you know, it's, it's so suppressed.

(19:50):
It's so frowned upon and it's, and it'sonly allowed within a very narrow
framework of what they say.
Yeah, right.
And, and botanical medicine, like you say,is the foundation of medicine in general.
I mean, it is the most ancient practice.
It's been used in every culture in theworld.

(20:11):
And I tell people, you know why I'm anherbalist and not know the end of the
pharmacos.
stuff, it's because which do you have morefaith in?
Anywhere from a couple of hundred to twothousand years or more of human experience
telling you that this thing has worked inreal life with real people over and over
again or a six -week double -blind studyfunded by a pharmaceutical company with a

(20:38):
vested interest in the outcome.
where half of those medications that areapproved are taken off the marketplace
within five years because they're found tohave too many harmful side effects.
Which one do you have more confidence in?
I have more confidence in our richtradition of herbal medicine.
The first herb I learned to identify wasyarrow.
And I read that yarrow was used to stopbleeding.

(21:03):
Well, interestingly, that is a Westerntradition, but Native Americans used it
for that purpose, and so did the Chinese.
Three different continents, threedifferent groups of people for over 2 ,000
years have used yarrow to staunch wounds,to help heal battle wounds.
And so when I was a teenager and I was outand I got injured when I was out with a
bunch of kids as a YMCA camp counselor,and I had this gash in my elbow that was

(21:29):
bleeding and I realized I don't have anyband -aids or any first aid kit.
I was lying on the ground, looked over andthere's the yarrow leaves and I thought,
well, this is as good a time as any to trythis.
crushed him up, put him in the wound.
By the time I got back to the main campand went to see the nurse, she goes, well,
that's not bad.
There's nothing.
And I had, so you have all this experiencethat people are sharing with you and then

(21:54):
you try it and it works.
What is so controversial about that?
You know?
I think that's what's interesting, right?
Is a lot of, I personally,
I'm trying to slowly move some of mycommunity away from the idea of like, I

(22:15):
personally don't think it's actually a bigconspiracy.
I think a lot of times we want to go inthat direction and there is components of
that.
There's no doubt.
I mean, we would be fooled to not see thatthere's always power dynamics, but really
what this boils down to from what I'munderstanding is that.
It really comes down to worldview and theunderstanding that there are different

(22:38):
ways of deriving knowledge or knowingnessor information about the natural world and
all these other ways, all these otherancient sciences or just the fact of
passing down a tradition for 10 ,000 yearsthat shows with direct experience, hey,
this plant works for this thing.
Our ancestors wouldn't have used it if itwasn't working, right?

(23:02):
And that way of knowing is not allowed inthe current modern framework is
reductionist science only type ofmentality.
And that's only one way of knowing.
And actually the other part of the funnypart is it's multifold, right?

(23:22):
It's like not only is it not smart to onlylook at one way of knowing, but...
this way of knowing that we're workingwith is actually also just generally not
the best way of knowing anyhow.
So you wouldn't want to use it only, youknow what I mean?
But like, it's not to say like, I'm notanti science, but I'm definitely, I guess,

(23:42):
I'd like to not be anti anything, but I'mvery much questioning of, of reductionism
and materialism in general.
Well, I am too.
And it's not that like you said, Iappreciate when there are studies showing
that like cinnamon helps to lower bloodsugar or this or that or whatever.
It's useful, but there's a number of herbsthat lower blood sugar, but cinnamon is a

(24:05):
spicy, warming botanical within astringent quality to it.
Whereas nopal, which has also been shownto lower blood sugar, is a mucilaginous
cooling soothing.
So the question is, and this is wherereductionist science fails, is which one
is more appropriate in working with thisperson, right?

(24:27):
Because the only thing they're asking is,does it lower blood sugar?
But they're not looking at the biggerpicture of what else is going on.
And as for the way of knowing, I have avery interesting story about that.
Dr.
Jerry McLaughlin was screening for anti-cancer chemicals.

(24:48):
And the most powerful ones he found werethe acetogenins from the American pop
autri.
They were...
highly effective at destroying cancercells with very low toxicity.
And he was trying to get it as proved as apharmaceutical drug, but was getting
blocked.

(25:08):
But he checked all the parts of the treeat different times in the year.
And he found out that the sedogens werehighest in the twigs in the spring, the
unripe fruits in the summer, and themature seeds in the fall.
So I was doing a presentation for theAmerican Herbalist Guild on his research
about Papa.
And people said, well, how do you use theactual herb?

(25:30):
Because I was talking about thestandardized extract he was making.
And I said, I don't know.
And then finally, this one lady at theback says, if you'll turn off the
microphone and stop the recording, I'lltell you.
She was a Native American.
OK?
Now get this.
Her tribe had been using Papa to treatcancer for hundreds and hundreds of years.
OK.

(25:51):
They gathered.
This is what she said to me.
They gathered the twigs pointing towardsSkyfather at the first full moon after the
spring solstice.
They gathered the unripe fruit at thesummer solstice, and they gathered the

(26:12):
seeds from the fruits that had been giftedto Mother Earth.
In other words, it had fallen to theground in the winter, I mean in the fall.
So they knew exactly which plant parts touse.
They extracted them by fermentation.
They're fat soluble compounds.
You can't get them in water.
Okay.
And they had been using them to treatcancer.
Now, Dr.

(26:33):
McLaughlin spent 10 years to find thatinformation of which plant parts were
highest, the fact that you had to extractit in certain ways to get it out.
They knew it.
How did they know it?
Do you think that they did this by trialand error, like for hundreds and hundreds
of years of experiment?
If you talk to all native people, you knowwhat they'll tell you.

(26:56):
The plants told us.
And in modern society, that has become tosound like those people are crazy.
But they couldn't be crazy because look atthe accuracy of the information they got
and that they were able to use.
And I said to her, I went.
to lunch with her afterwards, I said, Ican understand why maybe your people were

(27:17):
reluctant to share some of thisinformation with us because we didn't
treat you very nice.
She says, she says, natives killed whitepeople, white people killed natives, that
has nothing to do with it.
She says, it's because white people won'tfollow directions.
We tell them how to prepare it, we tellthem the dose to use, and they would think

(27:38):
if a little is good, more is better,they'd hurt themselves and come back and
blame us.
Yeah.
It's because it's because it's becausewe've lost this respect for traditional
wisdom.
We don't even, we automatically discountit.
And it's basically there's a mindset inour culture that only reductionistic
science is a path to knowledge.

(27:59):
And that, and that all the old stuff, allthose people back then were stupid and
they weren't stupid.
They weren't stupid.
It's so interesting because I think that'salso the biggest illusion that we're
living under.
And it's interesting because the firstword that I always want to use when

(28:21):
describing that is myth.
But I do not use the word myth anymorebecause myth is most often real.
Myth is typically what is holding a lot ofthis ancient knowledge in the stories.
It's talking about the plants and theanimals and the cosmos and the rhythms and
cycles.
so I don't like to use the word myth in aderogatory sense, but one of the biggest

(28:43):
illusions of modern culture is that allthese previous cultures were just
completely ignorant.
I actually have a new theory and we don'thave to go into this, but I have a, my
latest theory is that, and because I livedown here in Peru in the sacred Valley,
right?
So I'm, it's quite, it's quite a eclecticcommunity, right?

(29:09):
huh.
So there's the, there's lots of, you know,not lots, but there's definitely, I mean,
no one is going to look at you funny ifsomeone's talking about aliens or other
things like that, right?
Like no, no one frets over those things.
But my latest theory is actually, is thatI'm not opposed to the idea of there being
aliens at all.

(29:30):
But my main thing is that I actually thinkmost likely there, there wasn't and.
The main reason that I think that now isbecause the main reason most people think
that aliens existed in ancient times isbased on the premise that all of our
ancestors were extraordinarily dumb andcould not build the things that we find

(29:54):
that we think are amazing and thereforethey must be alien.
I would say that's a pretty good way ofexplaining it because I like I said, I
think.
suffering from that delusion that all theancient people didn't know anything and
that only we in modern society booth ourtechnology are intelligent.

(30:17):
And yet I will give this thing.
So take the average person in modernsociety, strip away their electricity,
their central heating, their central airconditioning, and throw them out in the
woods and how many of them could survive.
It's going to be less than a percent.

(30:39):
It is because we have all this theoreticalknowledge and all this dependent on
technology.
I had a technical writing instructor said,do you want to know how much you are the
master or the slave of technology?
How much of it could you recreate if youwere thrown onto a desert island?
We're dependent on our technology.

(31:03):
And that was one of the other things thatI had when I was a teenager was like, I
had this vision of the electrical gridcollapsing and, and, and what that did to
modern medicine, you know, where yousuddenly have no pharmaceutical drugs, you
don't have X ray machines, MRIs, all theseother things.
What are you going to do?

(31:24):
And, and so I, and even if you have like anatural disaster for
where the power shut off and you're kindof isolated from society for a couple of
weeks, what do you do?
I mean, we're very dependent ontechnology.
We've lost our touch with nature and weare part of nature.
We are interconnected.

(31:44):
This is a fundamental idea fromtraditional wisdom.
We are a part of all we see.
We're not superior to the plants andanimals and all this stuff.
We're part of it.
And they didn't have a hard time using theherbs or using the resources of nature,

(32:06):
but they used them according to need, notaccording to greed.
And they were grateful for what they got.
They were appreciative of the plants andthe animals for providing them with the
things they needed to survive.
And this is a...
something about the native cultures that Ireally resonate with and I wish that we

(32:29):
would be more grateful, more humble, morewilling to be open and not so arrogant
with thinking we're so smart and everybodyelse was so stupid.
Yeah, I was just telling, I couldn't agreemore.
I was just telling a friend the other day,I said, you know what's interesting?
I said, you look at all these cities thatare now,

(32:50):
Like, I mean, we're just getting ready toenter into like the water crisis.
I mean, this is going to be a massivething over the next 20 years.
A lot of people don't see coming allacross the world in different places.
But I was recently in Mexico City, alreadybig issues.
There's massive issues in Bangalore anddifferent places around the world.

(33:11):
And I was just saying, I said, you know,do you think if we worship that water, we
would be in these situations?
if you were in a deep connection ofreverence for water, would we be seeing
these situations?
And the answer is most likely no, right?
It's because there's not a deeperspiritual relationship with these

(33:35):
fundamental other, you know, whether youwant to call them beings, spirits, or just
- Energies, whatever you want to call it.
The elementals, the fact that we are notin a -
harmonious relationship with them, it'sleading to what we're seeing in the world
today.

(33:55):
And it's interesting because so manyclimate solutions are based on, again,
trying to use technology to just overridenature, right?
We're going to strong arm it, which iswhat a lot of our technology tries to do
versus realizing the premium is onconnection and the principle of harmony.

(34:16):
Right?
Moving more toward that.
But that sounds way too fluffy for a lotof people, but they don't realize that
once the intention and the energy ispointed towards something of developing
harmony, that all of the actions andbehaviors that cascade down from that are
the ones that will produce a world that isgrowing again with life and health.

(34:42):
Yeah.
Well, the mindset
that we have is one of, well, reductionismby nature is separating, right?
It is not wholeness.
One of the reasons why I like teachingenergetics is because it's helping you see
the bigger picture of how things areinterconnected, not just how they're

(35:05):
separate, but how they're interconnected.
And we're not going to change the world byusing...
governmental force or any of these kind oftools that we have, it has to happen
within human beings.
With them waking up and realizing that weneed to change from the inside.

(35:30):
So one of the things I was going tomention earlier is the reduction of the
medical system is not just the fault ofthe system.
It's the fault of.
Also of all the people who are consumersof it, who have adopted the idea that
there's some quick fix.
That if I've got a problem, I don't haveto look at myself.

(35:52):
I don't have to ask myself, am I takingcare of my body?
Am I eating healthy?
Am I living, you know, in harmoniousrelationship with the people around me?
Am I, they don't have to question what amI doing that's bringing this on.
They just go and give me a pill to fixthis.
Right?
Give me the pill that's going to fix this.

(36:14):
And you had talked about wanting todiscuss antibiotics.
And this is a good segue into that becausethere's no question that antibiotics were
a great discovery and have saved manylives.
But the antibiotics, this idea that I canjust go and get a pill and take care of

(36:40):
this problem.
is ignoring the other side of thispicture, which is the biological terrain
theory of disease, which is that in orderfor germs to invade the body, it has to
first be weakened or damaged.
And you can see that just the fact that ifyou get dirt or mud or whatever on your

(37:04):
skin, right, you don't get an infection.
You just wash it off.
But if you get a cut and you get...
manure in there and dirty, could be gunkin there, right?
It's gonna get infected because there's adamaged area through which the infection
can enter, right?
Well, the same thing's true with getting acold or anything else.

(37:29):
There has to be something that has reducedyour resistance in order to have that
happen.
Stress, poor diet.
I mean, if you look at the work of WestonPrice when he went to six of the seven
continents in 1930s and found theindigenous people living on traditional
diets were rarely sick.

(37:50):
They didn't suffer from the contagiousdiseases that their quote unquote
civilized neighbors did.
Why?
Because they were naturally immune.
They were eating healthy, they were livingin harmony with each other, they were
living in harmony with nature.
They were healthy.
The average person today is not healthy.

(38:14):
They're living on a diet of junk food.
They don't have harmonious, happyrelationships with the people around them.
They're not living in community likepeople always did.
They're not living a healthy life.
And they're just looking for the band-aid, the magic bullet as we call it, that

(38:36):
will absolve me of this.
So we wind up over using antibiotics totreat things like viral infections and
fungal infections for which they doabsolutely no good.
And the problem arises like this, sincethe focus is on killing germs, right?
you're never going to kill all the germs.

(38:58):
And the ones that survive are going to bethe ones that what?
were the most that were able to most adaptto the antibiotic.
Right.
And this happens in agriculture too.
In this book, I read empty harvest.
we're using tons more insecticides than wewere the end of world war two.

(39:24):
And we're losing twice or crops, twice theamount of crop damage to it.
Why?
Because every time you spray a filled withinsecticides, you're not only killing.
the insects, you're killing all thebeneficial insects that kill the insects
and you're completely disrupting theharmony of nature.
And the insects that survive are the onesthat are most biologically adapted to the

(39:47):
insecticide you're using.
So what happens over time is you'rebreeding antibiotic, I mean insecticide
resistant bugs and you just areperpetuating the problem.
And it's the same thing with antibiotics.
When you're
when you're using antibiotics wherethey're not really needed, you're breeding
antibiotic resistant bacteria, which is abig problem.

(40:12):
Modern medicine recognizes this as aproblem, okay?
But you know, the most cold, sore throat,sinus infections, bronchitis, ear
infections, and respiratory infections areviral.
So when you take the antibiotic, when theantibiotic is being given and a lot of

(40:33):
medical doctors knows as a placebo, right?
Cause the person wants it.
Right.
But, but the meanwhile, then whenantibiotics are needed for something that
you really could use an antibiotic for,they're becoming less effective.
Right.
And could we take a second before we gomore into this?

(40:54):
Cause I don't think a lot of people.
have heard kind of the classic story oflike germ versus terrain theory.
Could you tell us a little bit, becausethis was like kind of a major battle at
some point in the development of medicine.
Yeah, when the microscope was invented andgerms were first discovered, there were

(41:17):
two schools of thought.
The one school of thought, which is thePasteur model that we all
have grown up with is that the bacteria orinfectious organisms were there and they
were the cause of the tissue damage.

(41:39):
The other theory was is the tissue damagecreated a breeding ground for the
microbes.
In other words, that the damage to thetissues preceded the infection and that
the microbes were there as scavengers.
Of course, there's probably a littleinterplay between those two things.

(42:05):
Because for example, if we take foodpoisoning, the bacteria that cause food
poisoning, they release a toxic chemicalas they're feeding.
So if they're multiplying in a food, thistoxic chemical is in the food.
And when you ingest it, that toxicchemical damages your

(42:26):
intestinal lining, which creates abreeding ground for the infection, right?
And then you have this problem of foodpoisoning.
So because microbes release toxins, if youget a big enough dose of them, yeah, they
could overpower your body's innatedefenses.

(42:49):
So obviously, sanitation and cleanlinessand not eating spoiled food or
or keeping wounds clean and all that isimportant.
But the biological terrain part of it saysthat it's equally important, if not more
important, that I take care of a healthybody because normally we're surrounded by

(43:11):
a sea of microbes that we cannot kill allof them.
Or we'd want to because they are part ofthe ecosystem.
And so,
as, and normally they're not affecting usnegatively at all.
In fact, we need to be exposed to them inorder to develop the immune system to

(43:37):
respond appropriately with them.
So part of this is the research that showsthat if children are raised on farms where
they're playing with animals and they'reout in the dirt, they have healthier
immune systems than kids that are beingraised.
in sterile homes where everything isdisinfected.
And so the kids who are raised in thesterile homes are more prone to allergies

(44:01):
and autoimmune disorders because theimmune system does not know how to deal
with ordinary background microbes.
It overreacts to everything.
So I am of the opinion that childhooddiseases actually, you know,

(44:22):
properly dealt with, train the immunesystem on how to fight disease.
And that we need some exposure to germsand we need to get a runny nose when we're
a little kid.
And you support the kid in getting over itand the kid's immune system is trained how
to deal with this stuff.
And I know that's probably a verycontroversial idea for a lot of people,

(44:46):
but I know there are a lot of people whoshare that with me.
But the fact is, is that we've over doneit with the, the fear of the microbes and
the, and the idea of keeping things cleanand sterile.
Like, like, like it's, it's, it's not,it's not, it's like too far the other

(45:08):
direction.
Cleanliness is important.
Sanitation is important.
All those things are important.
That's good.
But in doing that, we've totally ignoredthe, the need to take.
good care of our immune system.
And when I decided, you know, with raisingmy kids, I wanted to focus on building

(45:28):
their immune system.
So I tried to study everything that Icould about how the immune system worked.
And so in addition to feeding them goodfood, one of the things I came to include
one is that loving relationships buildimmunity.
So I was always hugging my kids, alwaysbeing positive with them, always giving

(45:49):
them love and affection, not harshly, Idisciplined them, but not harshly scolding
them or being angry with them.
And I think that was part of what madethem have a good immune system.
It's not just about the physical part,it's also about the mental, emotional, and
spiritual part of our being.

(46:12):
I can't, every time I have caught a cold,I've been under a lot of stress.
And we know that that stress lowers theimmune system.
So it's a holistic picture that we need tolook at.
And part of what needs to happen is morepeople have to be educated, get this

(46:35):
message because it takes enough people onthe grassroots to start changing the
system.
It's an individual endeavor.
At the end of the day, it's an individualendeavor.
I couldn't agree more.
And yeah, it's interesting because...
Yeah, I mean, I like the, you know, Ithink Matthew Woods talks about it, right?

(46:57):
I've like the big, the big, well, wouldn'tbe elephant in the room, but the, the big
idea of herbalism is that we actuallybelieve in curing the potential of curing.
Whereas with biomedical medicine, actuallythey themselves explicitly state that.

(47:18):
they cannot cure, right?
That it's, well, you have a broken partand we're just gonna have to replace it
with whatever this thing is, or we'regonna block this thing, or we're gonna
force this thing to, or we're gonna giveyou a fake hormone, a synthetic hormone.
But this isn't me putting words in theirmouth.
They would actually, you can read this,right?
This is an underlying philosophicprinciple of biomedical medicine, that

(47:42):
they actually release any,
beginning to claim that thing.
And I think that's interesting because onething is even though that's their stance
that nothing is curable, it's interestingthat in people's minds, medicine still
lives as this idea that they're going toget cured using that medicine, which is

(48:06):
fascinating in its own way.
It's this cognitive dissonance that existsunconsciously in a lot of ways.
But I also think, you know, if there's
The beauty of herbal medicine is I reallylike acute conditions because it shows you
the power and the activeness of the plant.
I love diarrhea.

(48:28):
You know what I mean?
There's nothing better when a friend callsme and they have food poisoning or
diarrhea or whatever because they'llalways message me back within three or
four hours and they're like, dude, I don'tknow what that plant.
does, but like, my god, like this thing istotally stopped now or I'm feeling better.
And so I love it because of thosesituations.

(48:49):
But I also am continually trying to getpeople to this idea and even myself for a
long time that when I get sick, I'm notlooking to a plant or something to cure
that sickness, all I'm looking for.
is how do I support this thing, how do Isupport this physical body and the

(49:11):
immune's response as best I can?
And every time I do that with people, theygo, I'm normally sick for 10, 12, 14, 20
days, it's dragging on and on and on.
Whereas when they hop into a hot bath,when they have a fever or they wrap up in
a bunch of blankets and put a hot pad inthere,

(49:33):
and they're keeping their body warm andmaybe they're taking a couple of plants as
well.
They're like, I feel amazing after two orthree days of some rest.
And so to me, that's the name of the game,right?
It's like, look, you could be sick for 10,15, 20 days with the current way, or you
could be sick for two or three.

(49:54):
You're still going to get sick, right?
I'm not trying to tell you that plants aregoing to make it to where you never get
sick again, right?
Right.
But.
but we can dramatically shorten it.
And then I also, I'd like to know yourthoughts on this.
One of my theories of the many loosetheories that I hold is that because of

(50:17):
the way we're approaching sickness,because people are getting a fever,
suppressing it with ibuprofen or someNSAID or whatever, even an ice pack,
when it's a fever that's not so high, theyneed an ice pack where they should let it
run more, is that something is happeninglong -term there, right?

(50:40):
Where now you have someone who for 15, 20,30 years has continually suppressed the
immune system's response.
One of my theories is that that is mostdefinitely a part of the equation of
autoimmune as well as possible.
And a lot of chronic illness.
I absolutely believe that.
In fact, what you're talking about againis what I was explaining earlier.

(51:03):
The major paradigm shift for me was notchemicals versus plants.
It was the idea of understanding symptomsas the effort of the body to either heal
itself or maintain biochemical balance inthe face of a challenge.

(51:25):
that the symptoms were not the enemy.
And what I needed to do was figure outwhat the body needed to support its
healing process.
that the healing comes from the body.
You know, no doctor can heal a cut, butthe cuts heal themselves all the time,
right?

(51:46):
And as long as you have the nutrients youneed, the body will do that, right?
So when I switched to the exact kind ofthinking you're talking about, that's when
I started to get good results.
When I stopped thinking in terms ofrelieving symptoms equal to cure.
Right.

(52:08):
Yeah.
Cure is restoring the body to balance sothat it functions the way it normally
does.
Helping the body get back to a state ofbalance.
Right.
And I think it's interesting too, becauseherbalism also has that other factor,
right?
Where it's like, one of my teachers willsay that there is no person that could

(52:31):
ever come to you seeking help for whetherit's physical, mental, or emotional.
where you won't have something to givethem, right?
Because that's what we're holding, like asherbalists and with all these different
traditions.
Whereas this is the big issue for thedoctors, right?
Because when the person comes demanding anantibiotic and they send them home, this

(52:56):
happened recently.
My niece had hand, foot, mouth disease,right?
Which seems extremely uncomfortable.
And...
They have no way of working with that, butagain, even then, herbalism works at the
symptomatic level, right?
As soon as my sister told me, I said,okay, look, I can't just wipe this thing

(53:20):
away in one second, but we can ease hersymptoms in a way that isn't suppressing
the symptoms, right?
So we can get some aloe vera ice cubes forthe blisters in her mouth, right?
And then I think I gave her,
She'd been refusing to eat for about threedays because her throat was so swollen and

(53:42):
blistered in her mouth and gave her theAloe Vera ice cubes to swish around, as
well as I think we gave her some yarrowand elderflower to work in that area.
And my sister messages me, she's like, shewants to eat.
Within like three hours, she wanted to eatall of a sudden.

(54:05):
And so even then, it's again, it's thisbeautiful thing with herbalism that you
can work with symptoms and ease them,right?
Like we may give someone some cramp barkwhen they do have this horrible stomach
diarrhea type of thing going.
I'm gonna give them cramp bark, notbecause it's gonna necessarily kill the

(54:26):
bug or stop the diarrhea.
I just wanna help you with the crampsreally quick.
If I can just make you feel a littlebetter with the cramps and then I'll give
you another plant for the diarrhea orwhatever when the time is appropriate.
But doctors don't have anything to offerpeople on these things.
They don't have something of, hey, yeah,go home.

(54:46):
Try aloe vera, try this, try that to justmake it an easier process, which is
something that I also just love aboutherbalism.
often works very fast.
I mean, not always, but it often worksvery fast.
You, you, you're, you start to feel betterbecause you're just working with, I mean,

(55:14):
like, okay, the aloe vera, aloe vera isantiviral aloe vera is soothing.
And, and, you know, as far as I can see,mucilaginous herbs,
cool down the excess irritation or heat inthe tissues and probably help to absorb
some of the irritating substances that arepresent in the tissues.
So that helps cool it down and everything.

(55:37):
So it is working on both the underlyingcauses and the symptomology at the same
time because it's not a magic bulletbecause plants contain thousands of
chemical compounds.
that act on the body in very complex,interesting ways.

(55:58):
Whereas all pharmaceutical medicine isbased on isolated chemical compounds.
And you don't find isolated chemicalcompounds in nature.
Exactly.
Even when it comes to botanicals that aredrugs, that have a drug -like component to

(56:21):
them, there's still vitamins, minerals,and other accessory factors in there that
seem to have some kind of healing qualityas well as the symptom relieving.
I mean, I'm talking about something likeLily in the Valley, which I've used with,
you know, cardiac problems.

(56:43):
It's mildly toxic, but it to me, it seemsto do a better job of regulating the heart
rate and helping it get back to normalthan say digitalis does.
So.
I really think that like you say, thereductionistic mindset of how we have to

(57:03):
isolate it down to the to some specificactive chemical is is part of the problem.
Like I have a formula, there's a formulathat I have get from a company and I
actually helped that company get thatformula.
There was a Dr.
Wen Weiqi from China and he had developeda formula to treat herpes, an herbal

(57:24):
formula.
It also seems to work against shingles aswell.
And he came over the United States andthere was a university did two years of
research on this.
And it did actually get rid of herpes.
But when they took it apart to try to findthe chemicals that they could patent as

(57:46):
drugs, they couldn't find any.
So they said, we're sorry, we're notinterested in herbal formulas.
We're only interested in patented drugs.
And they just said, bye.
So he had gotten to know an herbalist thatwas working in that, with a company who
contacted me and we managed to get thatformula, you know, into that company.

(58:09):
And it works on that and shingles very,very well.
But why?
Okay.
People, people are like, why does it work?
This whole idea that we have toscientifically, rationally explain it.
We can't just accept the fact that itworks.
Well.
I really don't know how this thing works,but I use it.

(58:32):
Right.
I use it all.
I use it all the time.
I have no idea.
I couldn't build one if I tried.
And an herb is like that.
It's a tool that has all this complexityto it.
And I don't have to try to understandeverything about why it works.
I just have to understand that it doesthis and then see when, when is it

(58:54):
appropriate to do that?
That's that's herbalism.
Yeah, that's, that's, yeah, it's, it's, Ilove those studies, especially when you
take the studies of the complex Chineseformulas.
Yes.
And they'll do a study with, you know,it's eight different plants combined,
which is probably, you know, two or 3000or more different constituents by the time

(59:19):
you were to add them all up together.
Right.
And then they'll try it with just eachindividual plant and they'll be like,
that it's not coming out the same.
It only comes out in this formula.
And it's like, yes, that's the point isthat they figured out how all these plants
work together to create the desired effectand that it may not be just one of the

(59:40):
plants or even one constituent.
But I love those pieces of researchbecause it just shows the point.
Yeah, it shows the point that there is aplace for reductionistic
reasoning, and there's also a place forempirical, which is experiential based

(01:00:01):
learning.
And that the two, two can be usedtogether.
You don't have to have one or the other.
You can use both.
And, and I think it's like, you know, the,the metaphor of the right left brain,
which isn't, you know, as perfectly thething is sometimes people make it out to

(01:00:21):
be, but, but it is two sides of ourconsciousness.
that we do better when we use both.
When we engage our rational mind and ourintuitive creative mind together, we get
better results.
And also this is true in human society.
We have all these different people withall these different personalities and

(01:00:43):
whatnot.
And when we learn to cooperate and worktogether, all those differences make for a
better society.
You know?
Because we need a whole bunch of differentpeople, you know, with different talents,
different abilities, different things.
I, I, I don't know why I want going downthis tangent, but I see that what I

(01:01:10):
understand about the human body and healthis a metaphor for humanity and society and
the planet, because we are composed of allthese individual little cells that have
all differentiated and performingdifferent functions.
And as long as all those cells are doingwhat they're supposed to do, we're
healthy.

(01:01:30):
And they all, there are many, manydifferent kinds, many, many different
functions.
And as long as they're workingharmoniously together, we're good.
Well, it's just like society, you know, wehave all these different people, all these
different roles.
And when we have this uppity attitude oflike, you know, we're better than other
people and this is that, I mean, I've seenpeople who are like,

(01:01:53):
like look down their noses at people whodo things like plumbers and electricians
and what, how can you?
What would we do without these people,without auto repair people and all these
different things?
We need this diversity of interests andoccupations and we need to live in harmony

(01:02:17):
like the health of the body has to live inharmony.
And I think that's why,
Me studying holistic health has made me abetter person and made me a person who is
more easily able to get along with a widevariety of people.
because of that intuitive knowledge thatcomes as you start to absorb this

(01:02:41):
traditional wisdom about health.
So that went far afield.
All of this, I think, leads well because alot of times these conversations, they
zoom in immediately too much into...

(01:03:01):
the topic and the data and all thesethings.
And we're right back in that reductionistkind of conversation again without really
hovering around this thing.
And so let's go into, earlier youmentioned the eclectics, which is this
group of doctors and I think you said likethe late 1900s, right?

(01:03:24):
or the late 1900s, early 20th century.
Yeah.
Early 20th century.
Right.
And 1880 to 1920.
Yeah.
Okay.
Right.
They were of the mindset of we'll usewhatever works.
And in herbalism, if you start to, youknow, being a leader in this community,

(01:03:47):
you know this very well, but there's manydifferent paths that one can.
can enter or discover as they go, right?
I mean, you could completely learn aboutplants from the Western biomedical view
and only use them according to whateverresearch has been done on whatever plant,
or you may come from more of the folktradition of, you know,

(01:04:10):
ancient Greece or or ancient Europe orNative American traditions or South
America and indigenous medicines orChinese or Ayurveda, you know, Ayurveda.
Yeah, the big ones.
And so there's there's so many paths here.
And a lot of us, I think, as NorthAmerican herbalists, as modern North
American herbalists, it's definitely thisbig melting pot that that we take.

(01:04:35):
And so how would you describe your your
practice and how you approach it.
Yeah, well, I've I've borrowed from all ofthem.
You know, I because because I think it'svery interesting to see things from
different points of view.
I mean, I I started off with kind ofWestern herbalism, kind of Utah based

(01:05:01):
herbalism, which was Tom Thompsonian innature.
I don't know if you know about SamuelThompson, who, you know,
was basically the early pioneer herbalistto publish a new guide to health.
And it was when I encountered his book andhis material that I had my first paradigm
shift.
My second big paradigm shift was when thecompany I was working for created a line

(01:05:28):
of Chinese herbal formulas.
And I learned a lot of very interestingthings about the Chinese system, yin yang,
the five elements, all these differentthings.
And that added another layer of meaning toit.
And, and that made me interested in all ofthem.
So then I dabbled in Aravada.
I dabbled in this, I dabbled in that.
And my big thing was trying to figure outhow all this fit together, you know?

(01:05:51):
And so my, that's where I finally came upwith the energetic models that I use, like
my herb wheel and my aroma therapy wheeland everything is that I started to
understand there were these patterns.
know that underlie these things and becamejust very fascinated with it.
But honestly, I have a very eclecticattitude about the entire thing.

(01:06:21):
If a person feels like they need orthodoxmedicine, okay, go do it.
Because I feel like people need to trywhat they have a belief in because they...
If you try to force them to acceptsomething that they don't really trust,
you're psychologically working againsttheir best ability.

(01:06:41):
But if people are open to it, I'll steerthem towards natural remedies.
I see people who do a little combinationof both or whatever, and I'm okay with any
of it.
When I actually am working with someone,I'm often really trying to get them to get
in touch with what they know.

(01:07:03):
I've had parents call me about their kidsand they're talking and I said, well, what
do you think?
And they'll tell me, well, my feeling isthat it's this.
And I say, let's go with that.
And you know what?
It always works.
And I want to get people to start trustingthemselves.
You know?

(01:07:24):
That you have an inner knowing, an innerintuitive knowing about things.
And if you learn to hone that,
it can actually really guide you.
And so, there are times when I felt like aparticular condition required medical

(01:07:46):
care, and I've gone in for medical carewith something.
And there are other times when I feltlike, okay, we can handle this verbally.
And a lot of it has to do with just beingprayerful, intuitive, and really
believing.
that there are answers.

(01:08:08):
So I had a son who had undescendedtesticles.
And so I asked our midwife about it.
And she said, she talked privately to themedical doctor.
And he said, well, they say that you haveto have surgery.
And I go, OK.
So I got to thinking about this child.
And I got thinking about kind ofmeditating on what I should do about it.

(01:08:33):
And I felt like he was kind of a quietreserve child and he was often overlooked
by everybody else in the family.
So we gathered together, we all prayed forhim and I felt impressed to give him a
very low dose of ginseng, like five dropsa couple of times a day.
Two weeks later, testicles dissent.

(01:08:58):
Okay, so I don't know how that happens.
I don't know what this herb, I don't knowwhether it was just the prayer we all
said, I don't know.
But I've had so many experiences likethat.
And I think that people need to just bewilling to give herbs chance.

(01:09:19):
And prayer.
We've lost a lot of, I think that's, youknow, you know, it's interesting.
I studied religion in college, andprimarily Eastern religion, but it wasn't
until herbalism that it really brought meback to prayer, you know, and, and working
in a lot of people have prayer wounds,right?

(01:09:41):
If, if.
Right.
if you were suppressed by a Catholicfamily or, you know, some sort of
monotheism and these types of religions,oftentimes people become agnostic or
atheist and then they lose prayer andlosing out on the fact that prayer is also
one of our greatest technologies, right?
It's an inbuilt technology that we havealong with cooking and working with

(01:10:05):
plants.
These are all probably the mostsophisticated human technologies we
actually ever will have.
Yeah.
And, and it's, it's this idea that I thinkthat irregardless of your particular
religious beliefs, that we all have accessto a higher power, a higher consciousness.

(01:10:25):
I don't care what you call it.
Call it, call it God, call it universe,call it higher consciousness.
But, but I believe people have access tothat.
And if they, you know, seek for answers, Ithink they'll find them.
And so I tell people, I don't believe inincurable diseases.
I only believe in incurable people.

(01:10:49):
Wow, I have not heard that one.
I like that one.
That is a good one.
And it's because I think that a lot ofpeople are not willing to really look for
answers.
They bought into the idea that mycondition is incurable.
There's nothing I can do about it.
And once you believe that,

(01:11:14):
It's true.
Because you're never going to look foranswers.
And even if you're presented with answers,you're not going to even try.
And I figure there's always hope.
And that there are answers out there, evenif I don't know all of them.
And I'm willing to search for them.

(01:11:36):
And I'm willing to work with people tohelp search for them.
You know?
And that's why in my book, Strategies forHealth, strategy number one is believe you
can get well.
Yeah, super important.
And I also think it's, yeah, the herbal,the herbalist has a very interesting role,

(01:11:59):
right?
Because it's, it's, it's, it's, it'sholistic, which means, you know, we are.
you may give someone a plant for just themental emotional aspect of the disease
they're dealing with, right?
And just the fact that, hey, this isleading me to depression or anxiety.
And it's like, okay, well, we're gonnagive you this plant.

(01:12:20):
This plant is not gonna go for thatdisease.
This plant is going for the emotionalfeedback loop that's being created through
having this.
And I think that that's one thing I'mlearning as a young herbalist is that,
I'm finding a lot of people who were hyperobsessed with finding a cure.

(01:12:44):
And that in itself is its ownpsychological challenge to work with, to
help people kind of relax into healing andto not have this frantic approach to it.
And so it's interesting all the differentways in which we have to be like, yes, we
believe in a cure, but let's not pursue itin a way.

(01:13:07):
where we're just grabbing at everything.
Where you're stressing yourself out andtrying just everything and anything.
Exactly.
That's a very, very good point.
But the point you also just made is, isn'tit interesting that plants do work on the
mental and emotional spiritual side of ourbeing?
That I find absolutely fascinating is thata plant can help change a person's mindset

(01:13:35):
and belief system.
That, again, how does that work?
What is the, this whole thing is just suchan amazing.
I don't know, awesome mystery to me aboutjust leaves me in awe, you know, cause

(01:13:58):
I've seen that happen.
I, you have any good stories about that?
yeah.
I have a, cause I've, I use floweressences and I do emotional healing.
I do emotional healing work and I wasdoing, this is one of the most, I have a
lot of bizarre stories about this, butthis is one that sticks in my mind about

(01:14:19):
plants.
You obviously know Matthew Wood in SevenHerbs Plants as teachers, right?
And how he talks about the Easterlily,right?
As purifying to the female reproductiveorgans, helping to resolve this dispute
between sexuality and purity, right?
And feeling unclean.
So I was working with someone and shedropped into the memories of being

(01:14:43):
sexually abused.
And she curled up in the fetal positionwith her hands down over her uterus area,
just in...
agonizing pain.
And I didn't have any of my flowerremedies with me.
So I thought of Easter Lily.
And I actually had my, I don't remember,you know, I was just gently touching her

(01:15:05):
on her shoulder or whatever.
And I pictured Easter Lily.
in my mind and I tried to tune into theenergy of the Easter Lily and within five
seconds of doing that.
She uncurled and was out of pain.

(01:15:30):
It was, it was the energy of that plant.
It's it's spirit, it's personality, it'swhatever.
Not as physical form.
And I remember hearing that nativeAmericans said, if you approach the plants
with reverence, they'll heal your soul,not just your body.
And I, and I absolutely believe that'strue.

(01:15:55):
You know, and so.
I've seen amazing changes in people usingjust flower remedies and stuff like that,
but that was time when I didn't have theflower remedy.
I just called on the spirit of that plantto come help me.
And it was just almost like that.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's interesting.
I've the few flower essences that I haveworked with.

(01:16:19):
one of them was beach, the beach tree.
And, you know, after, I mean, youdefinitely, I mean, within weeks, you
start to get these experiences with, withthis, this essence and it's already kind
of blowing your mind of like, my gosh, howis this?
you know, how is it working?
And then, and as well as kind of releasinginto the mystery of it, which is a big

(01:16:41):
part of, I think my practice right now isallowing that mystery and just knowing
that they do work like that.
And I don't have to try and figure it out.
I can have fun while doing that and tryingto figure some things out.
But at the end of the day, it also ismeant to be a mystery.
But with Beach, eventually, yeah, it was.

(01:17:02):
If I just call to it.
call to it in my mind or call to it inprayer, and it'll start to just show
whatever needs to be shown in that moment,you know, and I've had some wonderful
experiences with that essence.
And yeah, I actually I don't work a lotwith flower essences these days, but but

(01:17:22):
that like you said, it's a whole nothercomponent of plants.
And I mean, and even a regular planttincture is going to work at that level as
well.
But if you just want to work with anessence for a specific thing, then you
have that option as well on the mentalemotional body.
Yeah.
Well, I think if you take a tincture ofthe plant and just use it in small one or

(01:17:44):
two drop doses, it acts very much like theflower essence does in terms of the
energetics.
I had another thing.
I was feeling really trapped.
Like I was in a situation and I didn'tknow how to get myself out of, and it was
making me depressed.
And I remember
Matthew Wood, who I really, really loveMatthew Wood, so I was glad you mentioned

(01:18:06):
him, and him talking about black co -oshfor people when you feel like you're
trapped and wrestling in darkness.
So I started taking black co -osh floweressence and within two days it was like a
light bulb came on.
And I saw I was only trapped because I wasunwilling to really look at all my
options.

(01:18:26):
And I immediately opened up to me thatthere were ways of resolving this problem
and I just needed to act on it.
and it lifted me out of the depression.
So that's why I say it to me, it's amazingthat the plants can actually help you on
that level too.
They're not just helping with physicalillness, they can help you when you're
struggling mentally, emotionally andspiritually.

(01:18:49):
Like this, why I like Matthew's book,Seven Herbs, Plants as Teachers, because I
think plants can become teachers for uswhen we allow them to be.
Anyway, I probably need to.
Look at wrapping this up because I've gotsome other things for the rest of the day,
but I have absolutely thoroughly enjoyedtalking with you.

(01:19:11):
This has been a lot of fun.
We'll have to get back together.
What do you think in the month or two andwe'll actually do antibiotics?
Yeah.
I talk about it.
Yeah.
I mean, this is actually, this has goneexactly how I would prefer it to go
instead of, you know, it's, to me,

(01:19:33):
It's you can have one topic, but it's waymore fun for it to be a conversation like
this.
But I would be more than happy to get backon and we can kind of go through
antibiotics a little bit more focused atsome point if you like.
Talk about, you know, how to work with aninfection from a holistic point of view
rather than just trying to kill the germs.

(01:19:53):
Yeah, let's do that.
Well, I'll be in touch and then we canfigure that one out in the near future.
Sounds great.
Again, we delved into some pretty deeptopics, I think.
So that was, but it was good.
All right.
Okay.
All right.
All right.
Stephen, you're welcome.

(01:20:14):
Okay.
Bye.
Bye.