I am very happy to host the first UK Herbarium blog party of 2012. You are invited to join us by submitting a blog post which describes how you relate to trees in winter.
It may be you work with them creatively or educationally – admiring their unencumbered outlines or familiarising yourself or others with their individual bark patterns and markings. Maybe you work with the bark medicinally or create wonderful pictures through bark rubbings. You may work with leaf buds in their dormant forms admiring their different colours and textures or making your own flower essences or infused oils or salves.
Share with us your experiences in words and pictures by creating your blog post and sending it to me before 20th February so that I can publish all those links on that day. I look forward to receiving your contribution.
Showing posts with label blog party. Show all posts
Showing posts with label blog party. Show all posts
Monday, 23 January 2012
Monday, 23 May 2011
May blog party : Flower essences
The wonderful thing about blog parties is the diverse wealth of articles produced by participants. This month is no exception.
Ali at Eldrum Musings offers a new (to me) way of considering medicinal herbal doses using the five elements from "earth" to "spiritual" which is the flower essence. She also shares her latest flower tinctures, white archangel and hawthorn.
Danielle at The Teacup Chronicles has looked at the background to flower essences and told her personal story of making and working with dandelion flower essence. I especially love her dramatic photos.
Debs at Herbal Haven has written a courageous article explaining why she doesn't agree with the whole concept of flower essences.
Lucinda at Whispering Earth blog has written a beautiful article, By Sun and Moon, descibing how she has made both a sun essence and a moon essence - something I have not yet attempted.
Jackie at Moongazing Hare has contributed a description of her personal journey with flower essences showing how anyone can make and use them.
My contribution can be found below. Again, it's very much a personal growth story. What I especially love is offering people who come to the Sanctuary the opportunity to build a personal relationship with a plant through making a flower essence. The whole process brings a delight and deeper understanding of possibilities which was not there before they started.
Ali at Eldrum Musings offers a new (to me) way of considering medicinal herbal doses using the five elements from "earth" to "spiritual" which is the flower essence. She also shares her latest flower tinctures, white archangel and hawthorn.
Danielle at The Teacup Chronicles has looked at the background to flower essences and told her personal story of making and working with dandelion flower essence. I especially love her dramatic photos.
Debs at Herbal Haven has written a courageous article explaining why she doesn't agree with the whole concept of flower essences.
Lucinda at Whispering Earth blog has written a beautiful article, By Sun and Moon, descibing how she has made both a sun essence and a moon essence - something I have not yet attempted.
Jackie at Moongazing Hare has contributed a description of her personal journey with flower essences showing how anyone can make and use them.
My contribution can be found below. Again, it's very much a personal growth story. What I especially love is offering people who come to the Sanctuary the opportunity to build a personal relationship with a plant through making a flower essence. The whole process brings a delight and deeper understanding of possibilities which was not there before they started.
Thursday, 20 January 2011
January Blog Party: A host of herbal hugs
I spend a lot of time during my bereavement courses emphasising the importance of touch. To find another human being who feels safe enough to hug isn’t always possible. Sometimes we have transformed into the prickly hedgehog which makes it difficult for those around us to offer the support we need. Sometimes we just want time alone. If this is the case, it is the perfect time to indulge in a herbal hug or two.
My favourite winter drink was inspired by Rebecca Hartman. Flax seeds decocted with a broken cinnamon stick and finely chopped peel from your breakfast orange is incredibly soothing. Rebecca’s original concoction was made as a relief from period pains, but I have found nothing better for making me sit still and do nothing for however long it takes me to sip the contents of my mug.
Warming winter tea
Place 1-2tsp flax seed together with a broken up cinnamon stick and maybe a couple of cardamom pods and some sliced orange peel, a handful of fresh or half a handful of dried rosehips and the juice of half an orange. Put all the ingredients in a small saucepan and fill the saucepan with cold water. Bring to the boil, then simmer uncovered until the amount of water has halved from evaporation. Strain, add honey to taste and sip while hot.
One word of caution, less really is more in this recipe. We have made flax seed tea twice during workshops using a tablespoon of flaxseed and several pints of water. I’ve also used dried orange peel rather than fresh. It is nowhere near as nice. We found strong flax seed tea on its own almost undrinkable until a drop of cinnamon tincture was added. Too much dried orange peel made the tea very bitter and not to my taste, although others enjoyed it.
Another totally delicious and unexpected drink is Nut Brew. Again this was based on the Hickory Brew recipe from Ananda Wilson's blog. Steeping nuts to make an infusion was not something I'd ever thought of, but it works wonderfully.
Nut Brew
1 part smashed hazel and walnuts (you could experiment with other nuts as well)
6 dates chopped
3 parts water
Simmer for 30 + minutes
Strain a cup at a time, leaving the rest to continue steeping.
Add milk or almond milk to taste if required, but no extra sweetening is necessary.
Sometimes you come across a herbal hug completely by accident. Two summers ago, I began to experiment with elixirs - herbs extracted in honey and brandy. One evening after work, while the sun still shone in the garden, I wandered around gathering herbs which nourished the nerves. In my basket went lemon balm leaves, violet leaves, rose petals, heartease aerial parts, wild strawberry leaves, St John’s wort flowers and four lavender heads. I let them steep for around five weeks before decanting the result into a recycled brandy bottle. It tasted interesting and I labelled it “Uplifting elixir”.
There wasn’t any call for this elixir over the following twelve months, although it did get used as a taste example when I gave talks and was generally well received. Last autumn, my son found himself in an extremely stressful situation, so I gave him a dropper bottle of elixir to take whenever he had the opportunity. He said it really helped.
I also sent small bottles of elderberry and uplifting elixir to my friend in Glasgow as part of his Christmas present. When he tasted the uplifting elixir, his exclamation of “Wow!” really had me wondering what this particular combination was doing. When I asked him to explain his reaction further, he said, “The elderberry is very fruity, and on the nose has almost “vanilla” notes. It’s possible that the tang – similar to the nice sharpness you get from blackcurrant, but without the bitter afternotes that blackberries have – is disguising the spirit to an extent.
“The Uplifting may have just the same proportion of brandy and honey, but it definitely feels in the mouth like a much stronger mix. There’s a tingle on the sides of the tongue that you get with whisky or brandy, and the warming as it goes over is much more pronounced, without being likely to induce a coughing fit.”
My hunch is that the lavender is the main cause of the increased warming effect. One of Kiva Rose’s students once called lavender tincture, “a hug in a bottle” and I know other people have found lavender tincture extremely helpful during stressful times. I’m looking forward to making another batch of uplifiting elixir this coming summer from the fresh herbs in my garden.
Another elixir which is becoming a firm favourite is rose petal elixir. This again was a 2010 experiment arising from articles written by Kiva Rose Hardin on her Medicine Woman blog. The first elixir I made was with a mixture of apothecary’s rose and ‘William Shakespeare’ – a deep scented red rose. To say the elixir tasted heavenly was an understatement.
When I gave a talk on tinctures to a group of complementary therapists in Northampton last November, I took a small bottle of rose petal elixir with me. I stood at the front of the group, cradling the bottle to my bosom and told them I could hardly bear to share it with anyone else – before I passed it around for everyone to taste. At the end of the talk, a woman came up to me, her face alight with excitement.
“How do you make this elixir,” she asked. “It is the best thing I have ever tasted and I could feel it lifting my spirits as soon as I swallowed!”
Luckily the recipe was in her handout.
I’ve made the elixir with dog rose petals, which is lighter and more subtle and with William Shakespeare petals on their own with different amounts of honey. It doesn’t matter how you make it, the result is still wonderful and a real treasure to keep with you during the depths of winter.
Finally, my other favourite herbal hug is my spiced hedgerow cordial. Made from whatever I happen to have gathered from the hedges that day, it is spiced with cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg and sweetened with honey or sugar.
Spiced Hedgerow Cordial
1-2lbs of blackberries
1/2lb rosehips
1 large orange (sliced)
1 and a half inches of root ginger (grated)
1 nutmeg (grated)
2 large quills of cinnamon
6 cloves
3 lbs honey
Place everything in a large pan and cover with cold water (I used about 5 pints). Bring to the boil and simmer with the lid on for about an hour. Strain the liquid and push any juicy bits you can through the seive. Discard the debris and wash the saucepan. Measure the liquid and put on a low heat to evaporate for an hour or so, depending on how thick you want your cordial to be. I had 4 3/4 pints liquid, so I evaporated it down to around 3 pints as I need enough for the party and a residential home demonstration and Christmas. A film will form on the top of the liquid, mix this back into the cordial before you add the honey. Heat very gently until the honey is dissolved. Steralise bottles in the oven for ten minutes, then pour cordial into bottles, seal, label and date. To make the drink, add 1 tablespoon of cordial to a small cup/goblet of boiling water. Sip and enjoy.
You could use half elderberries and half blackberries and more rosehips.
Possibly my favourite is sloes and rosehips flavoured with lemon juice.
Sloe/Rosehip Cordial
1lb sloes
1/2lb ripe rosehips
Place sloes and rosehips in a pan and add 2 pints of water and the juice and zest of a lemon. Simmer for about an hour until the rosehips are soft. Liquidise and measure the resulting liquid after passing everything through a sieve. Add sugar or honey in the ration of 1lb to 1pint of liquid. Heat until sugar or honey has dissolved. Taste. If it is too sweet, add more lemon juice. Serve with boiling water in a ratio of 1/3 cordial to 2/3 water or to taste.
A tablespoon or two of cordial mixed with boiling water in one of my Greenman goblets from Pickering in Yorkshire is a simple but effective way of treating myself when everything else is bleak.
My favourite winter drink was inspired by Rebecca Hartman. Flax seeds decocted with a broken cinnamon stick and finely chopped peel from your breakfast orange is incredibly soothing. Rebecca’s original concoction was made as a relief from period pains, but I have found nothing better for making me sit still and do nothing for however long it takes me to sip the contents of my mug.
Warming winter tea
Place 1-2tsp flax seed together with a broken up cinnamon stick and maybe a couple of cardamom pods and some sliced orange peel, a handful of fresh or half a handful of dried rosehips and the juice of half an orange. Put all the ingredients in a small saucepan and fill the saucepan with cold water. Bring to the boil, then simmer uncovered until the amount of water has halved from evaporation. Strain, add honey to taste and sip while hot.
One word of caution, less really is more in this recipe. We have made flax seed tea twice during workshops using a tablespoon of flaxseed and several pints of water. I’ve also used dried orange peel rather than fresh. It is nowhere near as nice. We found strong flax seed tea on its own almost undrinkable until a drop of cinnamon tincture was added. Too much dried orange peel made the tea very bitter and not to my taste, although others enjoyed it.
Another totally delicious and unexpected drink is Nut Brew. Again this was based on the Hickory Brew recipe from Ananda Wilson's blog. Steeping nuts to make an infusion was not something I'd ever thought of, but it works wonderfully.
Nut Brew
1 part smashed hazel and walnuts (you could experiment with other nuts as well)
6 dates chopped
3 parts water
Simmer for 30 + minutes
Strain a cup at a time, leaving the rest to continue steeping.
Add milk or almond milk to taste if required, but no extra sweetening is necessary.
Sometimes you come across a herbal hug completely by accident. Two summers ago, I began to experiment with elixirs - herbs extracted in honey and brandy. One evening after work, while the sun still shone in the garden, I wandered around gathering herbs which nourished the nerves. In my basket went lemon balm leaves, violet leaves, rose petals, heartease aerial parts, wild strawberry leaves, St John’s wort flowers and four lavender heads. I let them steep for around five weeks before decanting the result into a recycled brandy bottle. It tasted interesting and I labelled it “Uplifting elixir”.
There wasn’t any call for this elixir over the following twelve months, although it did get used as a taste example when I gave talks and was generally well received. Last autumn, my son found himself in an extremely stressful situation, so I gave him a dropper bottle of elixir to take whenever he had the opportunity. He said it really helped.
I also sent small bottles of elderberry and uplifting elixir to my friend in Glasgow as part of his Christmas present. When he tasted the uplifting elixir, his exclamation of “Wow!” really had me wondering what this particular combination was doing. When I asked him to explain his reaction further, he said, “The elderberry is very fruity, and on the nose has almost “vanilla” notes. It’s possible that the tang – similar to the nice sharpness you get from blackcurrant, but without the bitter afternotes that blackberries have – is disguising the spirit to an extent.
“The Uplifting may have just the same proportion of brandy and honey, but it definitely feels in the mouth like a much stronger mix. There’s a tingle on the sides of the tongue that you get with whisky or brandy, and the warming as it goes over is much more pronounced, without being likely to induce a coughing fit.”
My hunch is that the lavender is the main cause of the increased warming effect. One of Kiva Rose’s students once called lavender tincture, “a hug in a bottle” and I know other people have found lavender tincture extremely helpful during stressful times. I’m looking forward to making another batch of uplifiting elixir this coming summer from the fresh herbs in my garden.
Another elixir which is becoming a firm favourite is rose petal elixir. This again was a 2010 experiment arising from articles written by Kiva Rose Hardin on her Medicine Woman blog. The first elixir I made was with a mixture of apothecary’s rose and ‘William Shakespeare’ – a deep scented red rose. To say the elixir tasted heavenly was an understatement.
When I gave a talk on tinctures to a group of complementary therapists in Northampton last November, I took a small bottle of rose petal elixir with me. I stood at the front of the group, cradling the bottle to my bosom and told them I could hardly bear to share it with anyone else – before I passed it around for everyone to taste. At the end of the talk, a woman came up to me, her face alight with excitement.
“How do you make this elixir,” she asked. “It is the best thing I have ever tasted and I could feel it lifting my spirits as soon as I swallowed!”
Luckily the recipe was in her handout.
I’ve made the elixir with dog rose petals, which is lighter and more subtle and with William Shakespeare petals on their own with different amounts of honey. It doesn’t matter how you make it, the result is still wonderful and a real treasure to keep with you during the depths of winter.
Finally, my other favourite herbal hug is my spiced hedgerow cordial. Made from whatever I happen to have gathered from the hedges that day, it is spiced with cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg and sweetened with honey or sugar.
Spiced Hedgerow Cordial
1-2lbs of blackberries
1/2lb rosehips
1 large orange (sliced)
1 and a half inches of root ginger (grated)
1 nutmeg (grated)
2 large quills of cinnamon
6 cloves
3 lbs honey
Place everything in a large pan and cover with cold water (I used about 5 pints). Bring to the boil and simmer with the lid on for about an hour. Strain the liquid and push any juicy bits you can through the seive. Discard the debris and wash the saucepan. Measure the liquid and put on a low heat to evaporate for an hour or so, depending on how thick you want your cordial to be. I had 4 3/4 pints liquid, so I evaporated it down to around 3 pints as I need enough for the party and a residential home demonstration and Christmas. A film will form on the top of the liquid, mix this back into the cordial before you add the honey. Heat very gently until the honey is dissolved. Steralise bottles in the oven for ten minutes, then pour cordial into bottles, seal, label and date. To make the drink, add 1 tablespoon of cordial to a small cup/goblet of boiling water. Sip and enjoy.
You could use half elderberries and half blackberries and more rosehips.
Possibly my favourite is sloes and rosehips flavoured with lemon juice.
Sloe/Rosehip Cordial
1lb sloes
1/2lb ripe rosehips
Place sloes and rosehips in a pan and add 2 pints of water and the juice and zest of a lemon. Simmer for about an hour until the rosehips are soft. Liquidise and measure the resulting liquid after passing everything through a sieve. Add sugar or honey in the ration of 1lb to 1pint of liquid. Heat until sugar or honey has dissolved. Taste. If it is too sweet, add more lemon juice. Serve with boiling water in a ratio of 1/3 cordial to 2/3 water or to taste.
A tablespoon or two of cordial mixed with boiling water in one of my Greenman goblets from Pickering in Yorkshire is a simple but effective way of treating myself when everything else is bleak.
Thursday, 6 January 2011
January Blog Party : Call for submissions
This month's blog party is hosted by Lucinda over at Whispering Earth. She writes "With the festive cheer over and the weather unremittingly grey, January is often the least favourite month of people in the Northern hemisphere. That is why I have decided to give this month’s blog party the theme of Herbal Hugs.
The idea is to write about the herbs you find most comforting, supportive, caring and indulgent or the recipes you just couldn’t be without when you feel a little low and just want a big hug from your favourite plant friends. Perhaps you have one plant in particular that has been of great comfort to you, a favourite tea blend or a bath recipe that always calms and comforts. If so please share them with us here so together we can have a truly uplifting start to the New Year.
If you have your own blog then add your post before January 20th and email me the link at whisperingearth@gmail.com -I’ll post the links to all the entries here on the evening of the 20th.
If you don’t have a blog but would like to join us anyway you can email your piece as a word document to Debs at the UK Herbarium on debs at herbal-haven dot co dot uk and she will add it to the UK Herbarium blog as a guest post."
I know I have a few recipes I love to make during this time of year, so I will be sharing these later in the month.
The idea is to write about the herbs you find most comforting, supportive, caring and indulgent or the recipes you just couldn’t be without when you feel a little low and just want a big hug from your favourite plant friends. Perhaps you have one plant in particular that has been of great comfort to you, a favourite tea blend or a bath recipe that always calms and comforts. If so please share them with us here so together we can have a truly uplifting start to the New Year.
If you have your own blog then add your post before January 20th and email me the link at whisperingearth@gmail.com -I’ll post the links to all the entries here on the evening of the 20th.
If you don’t have a blog but would like to join us anyway you can email your piece as a word document to Debs at the UK Herbarium on debs at herbal-haven dot co dot uk and she will add it to the UK Herbarium blog as a guest post."
I know I have a few recipes I love to make during this time of year, so I will be sharing these later in the month.
Friday, 19 February 2010
Emerging from winter with herbs
Ever since Elizabeth set the subject for the February UK Blog party, I’ve been trying to think how best to address the issues. What does the word “Emerge” actually mean? It originates from Latin, where “e-“ means “out of or from” and “mergere” is the verb to immerse. So emerge can mean
• To rise from or as if from immersion
• To come forth from obscurity
• To become evident
• To come into existence
All this makes me think that during winter, we have been hiding, hidden in the darkness from the cold, possibly even hibernating. Now, as winter ends, we must come forward into the light. We must show ourselves, possibly our new selves, a self which is still developing as the season grows and changes.
In order to survive winter, we have immersed ourselves in warmth, we have slowed down, perhaps become stagnant, sluggish, but as the pulse of the earth begins to grow louder, we have to respond to the quickening beat.
How do we do this?
Activity comes first. We have to start actually doing things. As days lengthen, the light entices us outwards into fresh air and sunlight. Our bodies are depleted with vitamin D, so we crave sunlight. Some people may need supplementation. Those people who suffer with seasonal affective disorder may have been using a special light lamp. A combination of St John’s wort and lemon balm is also helpful, as is goldenrod elixir.
The depletion and slowing down of winter may cause our bodies to need a kick-start to get them moving again. You could start with a gentle detoxification of increased water consumption, a nightly herbal bath and plenty of sleep as set out in Jenny Jones’ article here. Our bodies may need tonics (see articles here and here ) or a longer term adaptogenic approach.
Adaptogens are described as herbs which increase the ability of the body to cope with and respond to stress. They have been shown to act on the adrenals and the endocrine and immune systems. Adaptogens were the subject of significant research by Russian scientists for many decades in the 20th century. They were looking for plants which would increase physical abilities for space travellers and athletes.
Their findings enhanced global knowledge about identified adaptogenic herbs. Most of these plants came from the Chinese and Ayurvedic traditions, with only five being found in European Russia and the US – American ginseng (panax quinquefolius), Eluethero/Siberian ginseng (eleutherococcus sentocosus), licorice (glycyrrhiza glabra or g.uralensis), Rhaponticum (rhaponticum carthamoides) and Rhodiola (rhodiola rosea).
Luckily, some of the Asiatic Adaptogens grow in this climate, so I am looking forward to growing ashwagandha from seed and holy basil this year. If I get really lucky I might try growing some reishi mushroom logs which would be a totally new experience!
In order to become active, you also have to do some spring cleaning. This may mean an emotional process as well as a physical one.
In order to emerge and declutter ourselves from the detritus of winter, we may have to go through a period of letting go with conscious intent. We may need to release emotions e.g. guilt, fears, sorrow, pain or anger where they are not helping us or are holding us back from moving forward. If an emotion is proving helpful, e.g. a righteous anger may be giving you energy to do what needs to be done, then it should not be suppressed, but worked with openly until it can be discharged.
Herbs can be amazing allies when emotions threaten to overwhelm us. Henriette Kress, Kiva Rose and Rebecca Hartman have put together wonderful posts on herbs for sorrow and stress. It doesn’t really matter in what form the herb is used, providing the medium contains sufficient essence of the living herb. You might choose a flower remedy, a fresh herb tincture, an infused oil or salve, a herb tea or a foot bath depending on how the emotion is manifesting itself in you.
If emotion is affecting your digestion, you might want to experiment with Goldenrod. Both Ananda Wilson and Kiva Rose have found this useful for “cases of mild to moderate depression, especially where there is seasonal sensitivity and general feelings of coldness, frustration and a feeling of being paralyzed by cold weather or more specifically, lack of sunlight.”
Kiva Rose goes on to say, “I am also very fond of it in where digestive stagnation is causing feelings of sadness, stuckness and potential despair, and in such situations often team it up with Rose and Ginger. I am especially prone to use Goldenrod for those who consistently feel cold and have gut stagnation where food just wants to sit in the belly like a lump, and where there is concurrent feelings of sadness and the blues that accompanies digestive upset and chilly weather.”
Herbs for guilt were discussed on the Herbwifery Forum during the past few months. Pine flower essence was suggested, or a combination of pine, mimulus and honeysuckle flower essences. Ali suggested that sometimes guilt is there for a reason and felt rosemary’s gift of clarity and insight helped you learn not to make the same mistake twice “without wearing too much of a hair shirt about it”.
Winter stagnation may produce a sense that our boundaries are knocked around or jumbled or tied up with those of other people you have had close contact with. It was Matthew Wood with his tales of yarrow who first drew me to ask help of this herb. I am touched by lots of other people. Sometimes their stories and circumstances affect me greatly, but yarrow always helps me realize I do not have to carry their burdens for them, that my support is sufficient without needing to rescue them from the situation.
You may favour a different herb for strengthening your boundaries. Some people like thistle, but yarrow does it for me.
Spring can be an anxious time for many people. It’s a lot more comfortable staying in the warm than venturing outside when you don’t know what the outcome might be. I’ve been working with a combination of skullcap, St John’s wort and lemon balm recently and they have proved effective in untying the knots in the solar plexus and aiding sleep where you would otherwise be lying awake all night worrying.
No matter what winter throws at us, spring will come. Snowdrops and crocuses are flowering in gardens and daffodil buds are already four to five inches above the ground. Cuckoopint curls through the dark soil and blackcurrant and elder bushes have beautiful pale green and purple leaf buds ready to burst.
However you emerge from winter into spring, it will be easier if you spend some time in planning and preparation. As with everything, it is not just our physical bodies that are involved, but our minds and spirits too. Whatever you plan, herbs will be there to guide and support you if asked.
• To rise from or as if from immersion
• To come forth from obscurity
• To become evident
• To come into existence
All this makes me think that during winter, we have been hiding, hidden in the darkness from the cold, possibly even hibernating. Now, as winter ends, we must come forward into the light. We must show ourselves, possibly our new selves, a self which is still developing as the season grows and changes.
In order to survive winter, we have immersed ourselves in warmth, we have slowed down, perhaps become stagnant, sluggish, but as the pulse of the earth begins to grow louder, we have to respond to the quickening beat.
How do we do this?
Activity comes first. We have to start actually doing things. As days lengthen, the light entices us outwards into fresh air and sunlight. Our bodies are depleted with vitamin D, so we crave sunlight. Some people may need supplementation. Those people who suffer with seasonal affective disorder may have been using a special light lamp. A combination of St John’s wort and lemon balm is also helpful, as is goldenrod elixir.
The depletion and slowing down of winter may cause our bodies to need a kick-start to get them moving again. You could start with a gentle detoxification of increased water consumption, a nightly herbal bath and plenty of sleep as set out in Jenny Jones’ article here. Our bodies may need tonics (see articles here and here ) or a longer term adaptogenic approach.
Adaptogens are described as herbs which increase the ability of the body to cope with and respond to stress. They have been shown to act on the adrenals and the endocrine and immune systems. Adaptogens were the subject of significant research by Russian scientists for many decades in the 20th century. They were looking for plants which would increase physical abilities for space travellers and athletes.
Their findings enhanced global knowledge about identified adaptogenic herbs. Most of these plants came from the Chinese and Ayurvedic traditions, with only five being found in European Russia and the US – American ginseng (panax quinquefolius), Eluethero/Siberian ginseng (eleutherococcus sentocosus), licorice (glycyrrhiza glabra or g.uralensis), Rhaponticum (rhaponticum carthamoides) and Rhodiola (rhodiola rosea).
Luckily, some of the Asiatic Adaptogens grow in this climate, so I am looking forward to growing ashwagandha from seed and holy basil this year. If I get really lucky I might try growing some reishi mushroom logs which would be a totally new experience!
In order to become active, you also have to do some spring cleaning. This may mean an emotional process as well as a physical one.
In order to emerge and declutter ourselves from the detritus of winter, we may have to go through a period of letting go with conscious intent. We may need to release emotions e.g. guilt, fears, sorrow, pain or anger where they are not helping us or are holding us back from moving forward. If an emotion is proving helpful, e.g. a righteous anger may be giving you energy to do what needs to be done, then it should not be suppressed, but worked with openly until it can be discharged.
Herbs can be amazing allies when emotions threaten to overwhelm us. Henriette Kress, Kiva Rose and Rebecca Hartman have put together wonderful posts on herbs for sorrow and stress. It doesn’t really matter in what form the herb is used, providing the medium contains sufficient essence of the living herb. You might choose a flower remedy, a fresh herb tincture, an infused oil or salve, a herb tea or a foot bath depending on how the emotion is manifesting itself in you.
If emotion is affecting your digestion, you might want to experiment with Goldenrod. Both Ananda Wilson and Kiva Rose have found this useful for “cases of mild to moderate depression, especially where there is seasonal sensitivity and general feelings of coldness, frustration and a feeling of being paralyzed by cold weather or more specifically, lack of sunlight.”
Kiva Rose goes on to say, “I am also very fond of it in where digestive stagnation is causing feelings of sadness, stuckness and potential despair, and in such situations often team it up with Rose and Ginger. I am especially prone to use Goldenrod for those who consistently feel cold and have gut stagnation where food just wants to sit in the belly like a lump, and where there is concurrent feelings of sadness and the blues that accompanies digestive upset and chilly weather.”
Herbs for guilt were discussed on the Herbwifery Forum during the past few months. Pine flower essence was suggested, or a combination of pine, mimulus and honeysuckle flower essences. Ali suggested that sometimes guilt is there for a reason and felt rosemary’s gift of clarity and insight helped you learn not to make the same mistake twice “without wearing too much of a hair shirt about it”.
Winter stagnation may produce a sense that our boundaries are knocked around or jumbled or tied up with those of other people you have had close contact with. It was Matthew Wood with his tales of yarrow who first drew me to ask help of this herb. I am touched by lots of other people. Sometimes their stories and circumstances affect me greatly, but yarrow always helps me realize I do not have to carry their burdens for them, that my support is sufficient without needing to rescue them from the situation.
You may favour a different herb for strengthening your boundaries. Some people like thistle, but yarrow does it for me.
Spring can be an anxious time for many people. It’s a lot more comfortable staying in the warm than venturing outside when you don’t know what the outcome might be. I’ve been working with a combination of skullcap, St John’s wort and lemon balm recently and they have proved effective in untying the knots in the solar plexus and aiding sleep where you would otherwise be lying awake all night worrying.
No matter what winter throws at us, spring will come. Snowdrops and crocuses are flowering in gardens and daffodil buds are already four to five inches above the ground. Cuckoopint curls through the dark soil and blackcurrant and elder bushes have beautiful pale green and purple leaf buds ready to burst.
However you emerge from winter into spring, it will be easier if you spend some time in planning and preparation. As with everything, it is not just our physical bodies that are involved, but our minds and spirits too. Whatever you plan, herbs will be there to guide and support you if asked.
Tuesday, 19 January 2010
Steaky and kidney pie.
This is a guest blog post by Danny Proudfoot, a UK member of the Herbwifery Forum. He wrote this story for the UK blog party on bitters. Please make sure you read the comments as well as the posting.
There is some disagreement over the order of kidney cleanses and liver cleanses, like which should go first, I guess it depends which formula you do, but as long as you do them sometime, that’s cool. Bowel and parasite cleansing 100pct must come first though, so that toxins can be quickly removed and not redistributed.
I had recently cleaned the digestive tract and got rid of some of the parasites that been driving me mad. Now that my detox pathways had been freed up a little…. I was free to try another kidney cleanse. I used the Andreas Moritz kidney cleanse formula, from Presentmoment.com, which I can highly recommend. This is collection of herbs which you make into a tea and drink over the course of the day, everyday for 30 days. Tastes very bitter to some people. Not to me though….tastes nice……which is another example of my taste buds telling me what I should and should not be eating & drinking. My mum did the same kidney cleanse and complained bitterly (ha!) that the taste was super nasty, very bitter indeed. I was like, what…tastes nice! My taste buds like these herbs….which means my body wants/needs them. I have since learnt to trust my senses, if I crave something, I have it, but I use my new found knowledge to satisfy the crave with the right kinda food. I use my head and don’t eat junk.
I was getting up in the night 2-3 times for a pee, so this was good reason to do did a kidney cleanse. Also, apparently, lower back problems can be caused by kidney troubles? Or so I read anyway. I had the mother of all back problems so worth trying this again. Tiny crystals accumulate inside the kidneys and the tubes that go to the bladder and when fluid goes through the tubes this causes lower back pain….apparently. Its all weird stuff this eh! Kidneys and lower back problems….never in a million years would I think that might be a cause of my back pain.
If the Liver is congested, which I knew mine was, this leads to sand, grease and stones accumulating in the kidney and/or urinary bladder. The kidneys are delicate, blood-filtering organs that congest easily due to dehydration, poor diet, weak digestion, stress and wild crazy partying late into the night! Most of the kidneys stones are too small to be detected using modern x-rays and whatnot. The herbs dissolve any accumulated gunk. Andreas Moritz kidney herbs are: Marjoram, Cat’s Claw, Comfrey root, Fennel seeds, Chicory herb, Uva Ursi, Hydrangea root, Gravel root, Marshmallow root, golden herb. Soak 2 table spoons of this herb mixture overnight, bring to the boil in the morning and sip 6-8 times throughout the day, always 1 hour away from food. Simple.
As a general rule, if you have a reaction to a herb, that means its working. That means there are toxins in there somewhere and that herb/formula got a bit out. Toxins always hurt coming out, which is why it’s important to try and control the flow of toxins coming out…too many and life gets difficult again.
The first day I started the kidney cleanse I had a blinding headache, ditto day two. As a rule I only get headaches when I detox…so I know when I cleanse and I get a headache that toxins are coming out Big-Time-Charlie and that the herbs are working. A good signal to know that….that’s a Top-Tip! Luckily this is a herbal tea so I just reduced the amount of tea I drank each day until I had no headache and then gradually increased the dose over the 30 days.
After a couple more days my ankles suddenly inflated like I was wearing 8 pears of socks, they where stiff, swollen and hurt. What the funk is going on here?
Well, it turns out that the kidneys control the fluid in the body, blood pressure, produces urine and regulates lots of bits and bobs in there in relation to fluids. This swelling of the ankles is called Oedema and old ladies get it because their kidneys are full of crystals and don’t work very well anymore. It was most starling to have this happen and I did think hard about stopping the herbs because it was fairly unpleasant….but…this is yet another signal that I was right to try a kidney cleanse in the first place…. that the herbs where working ….. that there were toxins(crystals) in there that needed dissolving…..so I stuck it out. Oedema lasted about 10 days.
Had I NOT known what was going on, I would have 100pct stopped the cleanse and discarded it as “does not suit me.”
Had a doctor given me these herbs and had I blindly taken them and had these strange symptoms I would have bitterly complained to the Doctor, told him he was a fool for giving me stuff that introduced new nasty symptoms. Probably would have reported him or something. Funny old world eh! But no doctor gave them to me, I was responsible for my health now, there was no one to blame but myself anymore. Which is why I read and researched so much, so I could make educated choices about my health. Now that I did understand, I embraced the hassles as proof that I was on the right track and hoped that by coping with the side effects, that in the end, I would be better off than when I started.
Over the 30 days on the cleanse, I had a multitude of spots and pimples, some heartburn. Strange rashes on my ankles, arms, torso, very smelly urine and again pretty off-world BM’s. Again all these are signals of detoxing happening, especially the dark smelly urine. Life was tricky and unpleasant….but my life was already tricky and unpleasant…so it was no change from normal …but I had the knowledge, or hope, that by the end I would be better.
Oh I almost forgot….The chief reason for doing this kidney cleanse in the first place was because of my long term major lower back problems…..and for the duration of the 30 days my lower back hurt like hell, some days worse than others, but everyday was full of back pain…punch in the kidneys dull throb pain, right inside un-itchable kinda pain….which again was no real change from normal….but it was defo worse. Maybe I’m over-blowing the hassles to you….it was manageable ok….tricky, painful, annoying….but manageable…. for the last 5 years every day I had been managing things, I was a pro at managing pain…………so this was yet more pain to manage.
So, all in all another pretty eventful cleanse. Obviously my kidneys where congested with something and I probably needed to do more, because the hassles continued for the full duration of 30 days. After the cleanse had finished the extra symptoms disappeared and fantastically my lower back was better. Hooray!!! Not cured. Not great….but better…quite a lot better too…..maybe 30pct better than it was before….and when you have been told, “tough luck”, “it’s the dust mites” and “learn to live with the pain for the rest of my life”…….that 30pct betterness, that 30 days of unpleasantness…..all that hassle was massively worth it….I was overjoyed-happy….jumping around the room happy…..shouting from the top of the roof happy.
Stupid doctors……telling me rubbish that I would never get better again, never be able to pick up and lift up me own kids again……yeah yeah yeah…..i know I have an “issue” with doctors…..but screw ‘em! They got it wrong. I was getting better.
Danny Proudfoot
There is some disagreement over the order of kidney cleanses and liver cleanses, like which should go first, I guess it depends which formula you do, but as long as you do them sometime, that’s cool. Bowel and parasite cleansing 100pct must come first though, so that toxins can be quickly removed and not redistributed.
I had recently cleaned the digestive tract and got rid of some of the parasites that been driving me mad. Now that my detox pathways had been freed up a little…. I was free to try another kidney cleanse. I used the Andreas Moritz kidney cleanse formula, from Presentmoment.com, which I can highly recommend. This is collection of herbs which you make into a tea and drink over the course of the day, everyday for 30 days. Tastes very bitter to some people. Not to me though….tastes nice……which is another example of my taste buds telling me what I should and should not be eating & drinking. My mum did the same kidney cleanse and complained bitterly (ha!) that the taste was super nasty, very bitter indeed. I was like, what…tastes nice! My taste buds like these herbs….which means my body wants/needs them. I have since learnt to trust my senses, if I crave something, I have it, but I use my new found knowledge to satisfy the crave with the right kinda food. I use my head and don’t eat junk.
I was getting up in the night 2-3 times for a pee, so this was good reason to do did a kidney cleanse. Also, apparently, lower back problems can be caused by kidney troubles? Or so I read anyway. I had the mother of all back problems so worth trying this again. Tiny crystals accumulate inside the kidneys and the tubes that go to the bladder and when fluid goes through the tubes this causes lower back pain….apparently. Its all weird stuff this eh! Kidneys and lower back problems….never in a million years would I think that might be a cause of my back pain.
If the Liver is congested, which I knew mine was, this leads to sand, grease and stones accumulating in the kidney and/or urinary bladder. The kidneys are delicate, blood-filtering organs that congest easily due to dehydration, poor diet, weak digestion, stress and wild crazy partying late into the night! Most of the kidneys stones are too small to be detected using modern x-rays and whatnot. The herbs dissolve any accumulated gunk. Andreas Moritz kidney herbs are: Marjoram, Cat’s Claw, Comfrey root, Fennel seeds, Chicory herb, Uva Ursi, Hydrangea root, Gravel root, Marshmallow root, golden herb. Soak 2 table spoons of this herb mixture overnight, bring to the boil in the morning and sip 6-8 times throughout the day, always 1 hour away from food. Simple.
As a general rule, if you have a reaction to a herb, that means its working. That means there are toxins in there somewhere and that herb/formula got a bit out. Toxins always hurt coming out, which is why it’s important to try and control the flow of toxins coming out…too many and life gets difficult again.
The first day I started the kidney cleanse I had a blinding headache, ditto day two. As a rule I only get headaches when I detox…so I know when I cleanse and I get a headache that toxins are coming out Big-Time-Charlie and that the herbs are working. A good signal to know that….that’s a Top-Tip! Luckily this is a herbal tea so I just reduced the amount of tea I drank each day until I had no headache and then gradually increased the dose over the 30 days.
After a couple more days my ankles suddenly inflated like I was wearing 8 pears of socks, they where stiff, swollen and hurt. What the funk is going on here?
Well, it turns out that the kidneys control the fluid in the body, blood pressure, produces urine and regulates lots of bits and bobs in there in relation to fluids. This swelling of the ankles is called Oedema and old ladies get it because their kidneys are full of crystals and don’t work very well anymore. It was most starling to have this happen and I did think hard about stopping the herbs because it was fairly unpleasant….but…this is yet another signal that I was right to try a kidney cleanse in the first place…. that the herbs where working ….. that there were toxins(crystals) in there that needed dissolving…..so I stuck it out. Oedema lasted about 10 days.
Had I NOT known what was going on, I would have 100pct stopped the cleanse and discarded it as “does not suit me.”
Had a doctor given me these herbs and had I blindly taken them and had these strange symptoms I would have bitterly complained to the Doctor, told him he was a fool for giving me stuff that introduced new nasty symptoms. Probably would have reported him or something. Funny old world eh! But no doctor gave them to me, I was responsible for my health now, there was no one to blame but myself anymore. Which is why I read and researched so much, so I could make educated choices about my health. Now that I did understand, I embraced the hassles as proof that I was on the right track and hoped that by coping with the side effects, that in the end, I would be better off than when I started.
Over the 30 days on the cleanse, I had a multitude of spots and pimples, some heartburn. Strange rashes on my ankles, arms, torso, very smelly urine and again pretty off-world BM’s. Again all these are signals of detoxing happening, especially the dark smelly urine. Life was tricky and unpleasant….but my life was already tricky and unpleasant…so it was no change from normal …but I had the knowledge, or hope, that by the end I would be better.
Oh I almost forgot….The chief reason for doing this kidney cleanse in the first place was because of my long term major lower back problems…..and for the duration of the 30 days my lower back hurt like hell, some days worse than others, but everyday was full of back pain…punch in the kidneys dull throb pain, right inside un-itchable kinda pain….which again was no real change from normal….but it was defo worse. Maybe I’m over-blowing the hassles to you….it was manageable ok….tricky, painful, annoying….but manageable…. for the last 5 years every day I had been managing things, I was a pro at managing pain…………so this was yet more pain to manage.
So, all in all another pretty eventful cleanse. Obviously my kidneys where congested with something and I probably needed to do more, because the hassles continued for the full duration of 30 days. After the cleanse had finished the extra symptoms disappeared and fantastically my lower back was better. Hooray!!! Not cured. Not great….but better…quite a lot better too…..maybe 30pct better than it was before….and when you have been told, “tough luck”, “it’s the dust mites” and “learn to live with the pain for the rest of my life”…….that 30pct betterness, that 30 days of unpleasantness…..all that hassle was massively worth it….I was overjoyed-happy….jumping around the room happy…..shouting from the top of the roof happy.
Stupid doctors……telling me rubbish that I would never get better again, never be able to pick up and lift up me own kids again……yeah yeah yeah…..i know I have an “issue” with doctors…..but screw ‘em! They got it wrong. I was getting better.
Danny Proudfoot
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