Latest / Beyond Labels Premium / BONUS: Introduction to Herbal Medicine with Amy Fewell from Homesteaders of America

Transcript

BONUS: Introduction to Herbal Medicine with Amy Fewell from Homesteaders of America · Beyond Labels Premium

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Hello everybody, I'm Dr.
• 0:01
  SPEAKER_01: Cena McKella.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome to today's program.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_01: We are discussing the question: how do I use God's medicine to achieve health and wellness?
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_01: Now, whether you're trying to prevent disease, reverse disease, or just feel better and have more energy, this is the show for you.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_01: Because in our attempt to achieve health and wellness, we often focus on what not to eat, things like sugar and dairy and gluten.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_01: In other words, we focus on the negative.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_01: While it's important to figure out and remove those foods that are making you sick, it's equally important to realize that we are not getting sicker just from foods we are eating.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_01: We're also getting sicker because of what we are not eating.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm talking about herbs and spices, or what I call God's medicine.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_01: Now, joining us today to discuss this important topic is Amy Fuel.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_01: Amy is a homesteading mama, a wife, an author, an entrepreneur, and an herbalist.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_01: She is the founder of the Homesteaders of America organization, as well as the founder of their annual conference.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_01: Amy is also the author of two books, the Homesteaders Herbal Chicken Keeping Handbook and the book we're discussing today, which is the Homesteaders Herbal Companion.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_01: You can find Amy online at thefuelhomestead.com, and I'll put a link in the description so you can click right on that and find her.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_01: She blogs on that site about homeschool, homesteading, herbalism, motherhood, and more.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_01: Amy, welcome to the program.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_01: Hi, thank you for having me.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_01: I'm so glad that you're joining us today, you know, as an expert in herbalism, um, because I want people to understand how important herbs and spices are to maintaining health and preventing disease.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_01: And I also want them to know how easy it is to use herbs and how accessible herbs really are.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_01: So, having said that, in true beyond label style, I'd love to start out with a how.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_01: How do you use these herbs?
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_01: So Amy's agreed to give us a demo.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: Well, more so, I guess a visual.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_00: Well, today I want to start with I'm sipping on some tea.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_00: And so conveniently, well, Cena and I had talked about doing a tea recipe before that.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but yesterday I ate horribly, like horribly.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: And so this morning I am drinking a really simple tea mixture.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: And it's just chamomile, nettle, and um peppermint.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: And so the reason for that is just because it helps soothe the inside, you know, it helps calm everything down.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_00: And um, so that's the first thing I wanted to talk about.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_00: And normally what I'll do is I'll make a big batch and have them in these big jars like this.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_00: And it's so fun making teas because this is one of the greatest ways that you can get herbs into your diet, um, whether you have it for health reasons or just to enjoy.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: The the nice thing about herbs is that you can just take them to enjoy them.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_00: There doesn't have to be a reason, but they they ultimately enhance your health.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: And so a lot of people wonder, well, what's the way to start getting into herbalism?
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: And a tea is the perfect starting point.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: And once you get into making teas, it you it's kind of like an addiction.
• 3:22
  SPEAKER_00: Like, what kind of tea can I make next?
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: And for what purpose?
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: And um, I have some students, we I've put together a virus course, and uh, one of the things in that course that students like to play around with is the teas and teas for fever, teas for headache.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so that's the first thing I wanted to talk about because they're so easy to create.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and of course, I do have I have a lot of tea recipes in my book too that people can go through.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's the first thing that I wanted to talk about this morning.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: And then the next thing was tinctures.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_00: Tinctures are a really great way, and I brought this visual down because this is actually this is new.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, you would love this.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um, this is an Andrographis tincture.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: And so I don't know if you know what that herb is.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so Thailand actually just approved this herb for COVID and um for preventing and and treating it.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: And so um we actually got some of this, and so we're making a tincture, but it's always fun to watch it because you can see the herb on the bottom and the alcohol on the top.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_00: And a tincture is just an urban alcohol mixture.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_00: Again, something that's very, very possible for you to make at home.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um, a lot of people think about medicine and you have to go to the drugstore to get that.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: I can't make medicine at home, but really a tincture is just herbal matter and alcohol, like vodka or bourbon.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and you would just do like a one to four ratio.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: And again, all that those recipes and stuff are in my book too, and they're on my website.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I thought it was fun, and then we just shake it up uh every day.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: And when you shake it, it all kind of comes together into this gloopy.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_00: It's not very pretty, but they work really, really well.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so for me, I go from like if we are sick or if we're trying to prevent something, I'll start with a tea.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: And then if we start feeling sick or we get sick, I'll go to a tincture.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: And then um, after that's done, you can just cap it in a bottle like this, an eyedropper bottle.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_00: And um, and then also we have, you know, a lot of people love elderberry syrup.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's big in our home too, as a preventative.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: And so all of these things can kind of just work together.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: And it seems a little bit overwhelming, but it's not.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_00: Um, once you get into it and realize that we were created to to do these things, um, it it becomes really fun and and interactive, and you can involve your kids like what you're doing.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_00: And uh it's just it becomes second nature once you really dive into it.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I love that.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_01: You know, and what you said really resonates with me because when I first started working with herbs and you know, creating herbal remedies, I was overwhelmed and with all the different options, and I was a little scared that I might create some remedy that might hurt my children or hurt myself.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_01: Because sometimes, um, like essential oils, for instance, they're very powerful and they're concentrated.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_01: So sometimes you need to dilute them and and whatnot.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes you can apply them neat or without a dilution.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_01: So um, it became a little overwhelming to me.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_01: And that's one reason why I really love your book.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_01: Because um, let me just skim over the contents to relay how she's really broken this down in an easy format for some, like even for a beginner to start, like a great starting point for a beginner, or if you've dabbled in herbs a little bit and you want to go to the next step, this is also a great book for you.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: She starts with just the basics of herbalism.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_01: She gives her herb list.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_01: She even um shows you in her pantry.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um, she tells you how to grow the herbs, but you don't have to grow them yourself.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_01: She also talks about that, that you can also buy them.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_01: Um, wild herbs you can find in your backyard.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_01: Of course, you know, this is if you're not spraying with herbicides or suicide.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_01: Um, she talks about how to how to make the teas, how to make tinctures, how to make syrups, how to make infused oils, which I also love that because you can do infused oils for like salad dressings and such.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_01: Um, how to make salves, uh, basically also how to make like healthcare um beauty products, how to make products for cleaning your home so you can get rid of those nasty chemicals that a lot of us use in our homes that do affect our health.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_01: Um, she even goes into how to use herbs for your pets.
• 7:42
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, if you're on a farm, you know, your your chickens and whatnot.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_01: So it's a really great guide for you know, for anyone who's dabbling in it or who wants to start to learn how to use herbs.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_01: I love this.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_01: I love this guide.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_01: Um one thing I wanted to show, well now she um Amy and I are gonna be sharing some of our favorites throughout this show.
• 8:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um one thing I wanted to say is while Amy's drinking a tea, I'm actually drinking um, it's like hot chocolate, it's hot cacao.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_01: And I've added into it um a drop of peppermint oil.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, it's so delicious.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_01: So this is an easy way to use another herb um as an essential oil, which is peppermint.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_01: It tastes like I melted a candy cane in my chocolate, right?
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_01: It's so good, but without all of the sugar and all the other additives or colorings that you'd get in a in most um candy canes.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_01: So peppermint essential oil is one of my favorites.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_01: Um I've used this a lot.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I've used it for constipation, um, and I don't even have to ingest it.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_01: I've diluted it in a carrier oil, and I'll show you how to do that in a minute.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_01: And I've rubbed it on my colon and it's like a almost like an instant remedy for that.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_01: Also used it for congestion.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_01: So I took a diluted form again, and if you just rub some under your nose and you can inhale, right?
• 9:07
  SPEAKER_01: These are aromatics, so you can you can breathe it in and it can relieve congestion.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_01: But what's really cool is that peppermint is also used for a variety of health ailments, like um IBS or even paralysis or asthma, Crohn's disease, autism, I mean fatigue or alertness.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_01: So, like if I'm gonna go do a talk in front of a big audience, I'll often put a little bit under my nose, right?
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_01: To improve alertness.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_01: So that's one of my favorite oils to use.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I'll share a little bit of wine later, but first I want to jump in and talk about how you got started because I find this fascinating.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you're an expert in herbalism.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_01: You've written this book, you make your own remedies or herbal remedies, right?
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_01: You cook with herbs, by all means, you are an expert, yet you didn't start out with using herbal medicine.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_01: And I want to read this from your book.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_01: You said, I wasn't always conscious of my health.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_01: The processed food that I put on my plate and the chemical medicine that I put in my body, they seemed a normal part of westernized culture.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_01: I never questioned them.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_01: In my mind, everything other than what a doctor or grocery store said was normal was alternative medicine.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_01: So imagine the surprise of some of my friends and family when they saw me pushing fermented foods, offering herbal tinctures and essential oils to them when they were ill, or seeing me out in public wearing muck boots covered in Lord only knows what.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_01: I love that because you're so relatable, right?
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_01: So can you speak to that?
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_01: So somebody who um relied on pharmaceuticals and over-the-counter medication, which I did as well, um, you know, that's what I was exposed to growing up too.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_01: All my family still uses um pharmaceuticals and over-the-counters.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_01: Going from that to where you are now, what prompted you to make this change to herbalism?
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so it was a pretty um, so it was a pretty neat journey.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: So, like I said in the book, growing up, you know, we I felt like I think about this so often, like almost monthly, I think about this.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_00: How often I was taking antibiotics as a child, you know, for strep throat and ear infections and and different things.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, the funny thing is that now as an adult, I'm allergic to penicillin and I wasn't as a child.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_00: And that happens very frequently because it builds up in your body, and as an adult, you become it can become toxic for you.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_00: But our biggest um change was so we moved out here to the country.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_00: We did live in town, and we had our first child in 2009.
• 11:49
  SPEAKER_00: And right before he turned a year old, he started having asthma attacks.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_00: Can you just imagine a small one-year-old child having asthma attacks?
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, my husband had childhood asthma when he was a kid too.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: And so back then I was like, well, it's just genetics.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_00: Of course, now I know it could have actually been, you know, other things in childhood.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_00: But um, so they put him on all of these medications.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, there were probably five or six medicines for asthma, and I just I didn't like that.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_00: There was this small, little tiny child taking all of these medications, and it just didn't seem right.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_00: And so I started, you know, started thinking about essential oils because I knew they were aromatic, you know, but of course I was always the person who was like, ooh, snake oil, you know, and and but then I thought, well, maybe there's some truth to it.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I was such a desperate mama that I was like, you know, I'm just gonna try it.
• 12:48
  SPEAKER_00: And so we tried it and they they started working.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_00: The essential oils started working, not with every asthma attack.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: It depended on the severity.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_00: And then, you know, I I made friends with nutritionists and and herbalists, and um, you know, they were saying, well, this can be from, you know, a vaccine, this could be a vaccine injury, this could be from uh, you know, an allergy or various different things.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_00: And so that led us into, well, what herbs could he be taking to help regenerate the lining of the lungs?
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um, what could we change in his diet to help that as well?
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_00: Like drinking raw milk can help regenerate the lung lining, it can help with mucus in the body to really, you know, get that enhanced.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_00: And and so his medical condition really set us on the path into a more natural lifestyle, wanting to live more naturally, realizing our own issues and our own life.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_00: Like we literally ate from a box all the time, you know, and it was overly processed food.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: We felt horrible.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and sometimes you don't know you feel horrible until you feel good, is the crazy thing.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_00: And so as we started implementing these herbal protocols and changing our diet that led us into homesteading and raising our own food.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_00: And now we are into this, probably, gosh, 10 or so years now, have been into it.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_00: And I his asthma is completely gone.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um he outgrew his asthma probably around the age of five or six, which is not uncommon with childhood asthma, but the main reason for that is because it can take that long for the lining of the lungs to regenerate on their own.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and we kind of feel like we pushed it along because um, when we saw the asthma expert, he kind of was thinking he wouldn't outgrow it until he was 10 or 11, based on the severity of his asthma.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_00: And so I feel like we probably shaved a good five years off of that just by implementing herbs to speed up the process to make him just a healthier individual overall.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: And um, and you know, and I won't discredit the miracle of healing either, you know, and I feel like God really gave us these herbs and just living a natural lifestyle to help us be healthy.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_00: You know, there's a reason that the Bible says, you know, these plants and leaves and trees and are are for you, for your health.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_00: And I truly believe that, you know, and implementing that, you know, the one thing I tell people is you don't have to have 300 herbs, you know, you don't have to do that.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't have to be overwhelming.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_00: You can pick even just 20 herbs and and study them religiously.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_00: And then as you start understanding how herbs work with the human body, then you're kind of like, well, I don't need this, I'll I'll take this instead, you know.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_00: And so just his health really set us on this journey into herbalism and me researching.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_00: And then I loved it, and I loved trying to help other people, and my family thought I was crazy, and um, but you know, even now I'm I'm constantly making tinctures for people um because they're just the quickest way to kind of get herbs into people, and um, and just you know, there's something to be said about experience as you live this lifestyle and you experience it more and you're you're diving into it more, you naturally begin to help other people.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I wrote the book because the one thing I always heard was I don't even know where to begin.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I need there's no book all in one spot, you know, where all this information is.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_00: And now I could totally rewrite this book now, uh, even though I, you know, because I was still fairly new when I wrote the book, I could literally write another book this size just with all of the other things that I've learned.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: But um, and maybe I will one day.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_01: That would be awesome.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_01: I'd be your first customer.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_00: Well, you know, and the one thing that I'm learning is that people, oh my goodness, this book, I can't even buy my own book anymore unless I buy it from Amazon.
• 16:38
  SPEAKER_00: Because during the pandemic, um, Amazon and Barnes Noble bought every book that I had that the publisher had left because people were so hungry for information on how to heal themselves or how to keep themselves healthy.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_00: Because I think what's happened is we've more than normal, we've lost faith in this broken medical system that we have.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_00: And it's it's not just hidden now, it's it's on display for everyone to see.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_00: You know, there are there are things happening that doctors don't know what they're doing sometimes.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_00: You know, they just give you a medicine for a symptom and they don't actually get to the root of that symptom.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_00: And so it's been a really interesting journey.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I have, you know, I'm always a student and I tell my students that too.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_00: Like I never want to reach a point where I feel like I know everything because there are hundreds of thousands of plants in those worlds, and I always want to be studying them and always be a student of them.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_01: I love that.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_01: I love that yearning and that craving to continue learning, you know.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_01: And Joel and I are both the same way, you know, no matter how many books we've we publish or how many talks we give or whatever credentials we have, we always want to keep learning and keep being inspired, you know.
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and and it it just helps you grow and to learn new perspectives.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_01: And herbs aren't something that I was raised with either.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_01: You know, my mom occasionally dabbled in, like I remember her trying to grow cilantro in the backyard, although it always died, you know.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but um, but we didn't take herbal, like I said, we didn't take herbal medicines and herbal remedies, you know.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but as I've been learning more about herbs, I've I've been learning a multitude of things and I wanted to um to kind of throw these out there and let you talk about them.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_01: One is that I've learned that our ancestors would have consumed a lot of herbs, like they wouldn't not just use them for medicinal purposes, but like I referred to in the introduction of this show, they would have used them in their daily diet as a preventative, right?
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_01: So can you speak to that?
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, herbalism goes back, as we know, it can go back even into biblical times.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_00: But we have historically and scientifically seen herbs, you know, especially throughout the Egyptians.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, they were an advanced civilization that that truly knew how to treat issues and how to incorporate herbalism into their daily life.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that's one thing that we we need to remember is that herbalism now, it's almost like we have to make room for it.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_00: Where civilizations ago, this was just life, you know, there were not pharmaceuticals to depend on.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_00: They ate herbs every day.
• 19:33
  SPEAKER_00: They, you know, even the Bible talks about one of my favorite things to talk about students too is bitters, eating bitter herbs.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_00: And there's something behind that, you know, because it helps bitter herbs are um they help get your digestive juices going, they help you digest food better.
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_00: And throughout the Bible, it talks about that.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_00: How God even God commanded the Israelites to eat bitter herbs during a feast or whatever.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_01: And would this be like like dandelion?
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, like dandelion or you know, thing there are so many bitter herbs.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but yes, dandelion is the most common one that people that's why you said that most common one that people think about.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_00: And that's something that's a weed, right?
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_00: That grows in most people's yards.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_00: And people just have no idea.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_00: And it kind of makes me wonder, you know, who designated the dandelion as a weed?
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_00: You know, why like it's even a pretty flower?
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_00: Why wouldn't you let it grow in your yard?
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_01: I know you know what's funny about that is that I don't did you do this as a kid too.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_01: Would you pick them, you know, when they when they're in the seed form?
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, pick them, make a wish and blow on it, right?
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I'm sure most of us probably have done that.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_01: My parents would get so upset.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_01: Mine too, right?
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_01: Because they're like spreading the seeds.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_01: Now I'm gonna have more dandelion.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_01: Now, when I actually urge my children, I was like, when it goes in the seed form, get over there, make a wish and blow that all over the yard.
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, isn't that so funny how we've changed in just a generation?
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you know, and you know, so we've we've seen herbs, um, even excavation, you know, we see civilizations using herbs throughout their daily life.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_00: And now that doesn't mean that we haven't had issues.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, there are plenty of ages and time frames in history where we see viruses and and disease prevalent.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but you know, generally that has to do with travel.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you've noticed throughout history, commonly diseases spread when a people group is traveling to another location, and then you've got all of this stuff floating around, and and you know, and so Native Americans were really well known for daily herbal intake, you know, and they that's because they wild foraged, they were eating what was available to them.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_00: And so herbalism has stretched across the humanity of time, you know, the uh from the beginning of the ages until now, we have consistently lived an herbal lifestyle.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_00: The difference between now and then is that now we have to find.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: fight to live this way.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_00: And we have to reteach people how to live this way.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: Where back then it was just, it was like cooking an egg in the morning.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_00: Like kids didn't have to think about it.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_00: They knew, oh, okay, well, I'm going to have nettle for, you know, and a tea because it's going to help my digestive tract or, or it's going to help with a cold, or, you know, and then it was passed on from generation to generation.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_00: And so now we're most of us are a few generations removed and we're relearning that.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_00: And so, you know, the best place to start it is books and looking throughout history.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_00: And now I always caution people too because there are, you know, there are some um herbal transcripts from back in the day, you know, even in especially in the 1800s especially where they would recommend herbs and they should not have, you know, there are herbs that could literally kill you, you know, but and so now we have better information as, you know, as information and technology ages increases, we are doing studies more now to pinpoint what herbs can treat certain ailments, um, just like the Andrographis tincture that I showed in the beginning.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_00: We can we can study things more and understand more how they work.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_00: You know, centuries ago we ate herbs and took herbs because we physically saw something working.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_00: But that doesn't always mean that they didn't just get lucky.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_00: You know, um nowadays we can really look at an herb and we can pinpoint okay this is the compounds in that herb and this is how they work and this is how they'll work with your body.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_00: And so you know we just started a a virus course and the first thing that I'm teaching students in that course is how do herbs work with your body?
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_00: Because once you can understand that then it's not so scary.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_00: You know, then you're like, oh well I could drink this tea every day.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_00: I can make that tincture.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_00: And the reality is that you can do this.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_00: If if people centuries ago had no fear of doing this, then why don't we?
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and certainly there's precautions to take and you know and those are those are things you'll have to research on your own or or get books or um get a field guide.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_00: I love the Peterson field guides uh for specific regions because they kind of show you which plants to eat and which not to eat.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_00: But I think it's just really encouraging how far herbalism has come because we've gone from you know nomadic people who are are doing it every day who you know I even look back in history now and think well if you had taken this herb during the Spanish flu, you know, we could have avoided this but you know there where we lack in history is simply from lack of education.
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_00: And now we can't claim that anymore.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_00: Now we have such vast and amazing techniques and knowledge where we can do studies and we can figure out how these herbs work with the body and now more than ever we should be confident in using them.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah I love that.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_01: And I think it's important to also re realize that you know we evolved or adapted whatever your you know whatever your perception may be um evolved or adapted alongside these herbs right um so we are designed to work in synergy with them.
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_01: And in fact I mean herbs can um can shift your microbiome you know throughout your body and on your skin.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_01: So um as we well know now having a healthy robust diverse microbiome is critical for resiliency for reversing disease for preventing disease we've seen that now with with COVID even right um it's an it's a critical component of your health and wellness 70 to 80% of your immune system is in your gastrointestinal tract which includes your microbiome and taking these herbs um like in in your food consuming them with your food on a daily basis can really help to create and maintain that type of robust microbiome versus um let's say you know if you're not maintaining your microbiome and then you're gonna get you get sick and then you're gonna rely on a pharmaceutical well pharmaceuticals are a newer invention right I mean they're like babies in in respect to how long we've walked this earth.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_01: So our bodies aren't necessarily designed to work in synergy with those pharmaceuticals and in fact um I wonder if you can talk about this a little bit more but many pharmaceuticals are actually modeled off herbs.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_01: Right off so can you you know kind of talk a little bit more about that enlighten us.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah yeah so this is where we get into pharmacokinetics and pharmacognosy and all that stuff and um you know the funny thing is so in herbalism it's I love that you talk about essential oils because in herbalism typically we don't talk about essential oils they're the next step after herbalism and you know because this is a really good way for for us to kind of move into pharmaceuticals.
• 27:14
  SPEAKER_00: So you have herbs as a whole plant and I often like to say we use a whole plant for a whole body and so there you know we have one herb that is whole we're not taking any one component necessarily from it and then we're treating your whole body so we are getting that all the compounds in that herb.
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_00: The next step is to move on to something stronger which is like essential oils.
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_00: And so essential oils you're not using a whole herb it's the step before pharmaceuticals and this is where we're extracting just volatile oils from the plant.
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_00: We're not using the plant matter itself and so essential oils we most of us know are the oils that keep the plant healthy and safe and um you know even some plants have it as a predator resistor you know it can be stingy to their eyes or or whatnot.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_00: So that's kind of the baby step into the pharmaceutical industry.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_00: But then we get into pharmaceuticals and though that's where we literally take an herb in in many cases as long as it's not a synthetic drug and we extract just one component or two components from that herb and we leave the rest behind.
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_00: And of course they do this in various different ways and extractions um you know but the issue with that is that our bodies were created to process a whole herb.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_00: Our bodies were not necessarily created to process just one component of it because all of those components can work together.
• 28:43
  SPEAKER_00: Now that's not to say that there aren't these miracle drugs, you know, like let's say a pharmaceutical CBD oil um you know obviously if you have a child for example that has seizures you don't want him taking you know CBD and it's raw form, right?
• 29:00
  SPEAKER_00: Or or you know and so we have good pharmaceuticals in a sense but then we have the harsh pharmaceuticals like diabetic medication we have heart, you know heart blood pressure and and all kinds of things.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_00: I mean that it's just vast.
• 29:16
  SPEAKER_00: And so this is why pharmaceuticals come with this long list of side effects because you know in in herbalism obviously with some herbs there are not necessarily side effects but there are issues that could arise you know there they could be liver damaging or they could you could have an allergic reaction to them depending on the length that you take the herb or whatnot.
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_00: But pharmaceuticals have literally a pamphlet a mile long of side effects and this is because your body was not created to metabolize that that one component and all the other chemicals that are in that pharmaceutical pill or or syrup um you know and so obviously pharmaceuticals hold their place but the reality is that I like that you said you know we have kind of been damaged our our parents' bodies were damaged even some of our grandparents' bodies were damaged from pharmaceuticals from processed foods that now we are genetically altered to be sick.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_00: You know we don't our bodies don't know how to to react and act to something and so um you know when when we I never want to deter somebody you know I because we can get in trouble for that right to not go to the doctor or not take a pharmaceutical but I would encourage people you know pharmaceuticals are designed to work quickly.
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_00: Herbs can work quickly as well but you have to take them like every hour or every you know three hours if you're trying to treat something.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_00: And so a lot of people you know don't want to dive into herbalism because it's too inconvenient for them where popping a pill is just oh I can take it in the morning and then I'm done.
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_00: But the reality is that there are so many things in that pill that are damaging to your body.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_00: And if we would we were on the right track right we we started studying herbs and we started realizing that herbs worked but then in pure human form, well they don't work fast enough or they're a little too inconvenient to take every hour.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_00: And so we tried to make this this pill that works quicker and better and in the long run it's just damaged us completely.
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_01: Well also you can't patent the herb right right so there's a big money grab here.
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yep that you can take a component of it right and and have claims to that component and you can patent that and make money off of it.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_01: So you can't make money off dandelion if I can grow that in my backyard.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_01: Right and take it and and just rip it out and boil it and you know make it into a tea.
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_01: So there is a money component here as well.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm gonna I'm I'll dive more into that in another um another topic so that I don't have to bring you there with me.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_01: Oh that could be a lengthy topic.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yes yes yes we're gonna dive into that and you know and um the flexner report and you know how we really shifted away from herbs um because that's another critical component to to learning.
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_00: Well and the other thing is too you can't regulate herbs.
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_00: You know if you have this entire group of people that are like oh yes herbalism and it's healing me and I'm sharing it with other people and it goes along with what you said, you know, you can't patent it but you also can't regulate it.
• 32:34
  SPEAKER_00: And so it comes under this whole control issue.
• 32:37
  SPEAKER_00: Well we have to keep people safe is what they say you know but the reality is that if people are taking care of themselves then they don't they don't need a pharmaceutical company.
• 32:47
  SPEAKER_00: They don't need a government taking care of them.
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly and you know what I find interesting um and I love talking to you because you know this is not where I thought this conversation would go but now we're here so I love this um one thing I find interesting is that a lot of my friends and my family you know my ex my extended family who don't use herbs um you know maybe a little bit in cooking right they might use oregano or some cilantro in their cooking certainly don't use them in um a medicinal sense and they're afraid to use them and it's interesting because these are my same friends who are small government people right they're more libertarian they don't want the government involved in different aspects of their lives right like let's get them out of let's get them out of the food let's get them out of out of the pharmaceuticals let's get them out of the schools right right um libertarian through and through but because they're like well these herbs aren't regulated right FDA regulating these herbs right yes right yes yes and it's big as pet peeve oh my goodness but you've you've experienced the same yes oh and it and just personally and online I see this mindset can the one of my favorite um comments that I get on a lot of my stuff online is well what what do you have a degree in or or what what's your experience you you're not a doctor and so since you're not a doctor you can't possibly know what you're talking about.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah and you know I just laugh because when you think of people who studied medicine doctors are trained to study a certain way and generally they're trained to study pharmaceuticals and how those pharmaceuticals are going to help you right there's books thick books on here's the list of pharmaceuticals and here's what you use them for.
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_00: But when we go into herbalism you know my husband and I had this conversation the other day we are stuck in this mindset that everyday average people can't think for themselves.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah they they can't do their own research they can't suddenly understand how the human body works and only because they don't have a degree or they didn't go to college or it's not the norm.
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_00: And it just baffles me because I I the mindset is just it's fallible you know to I might not be able to afford hundreds of thousands of dollars to go to college to become a doctor but I can study just as much you know and better because my study would be herbalism.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_00: It wouldn't be training to pharmaceuticals would be training to herbalism.
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_00: Does it you know and so it does it baffles me too because that I would say more than anything that is the biggest roadblock for me when trying to teach people about herbalism is they have a closed mindset.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_00: Well herbs aren't regulated they're not tested which they are they there are so many more studies now than ever before um and you know you're not a doctor and and I'm like what so what you know so what?
• 35:55
  SPEAKER_00: And it's just it's so discouraging but it makes me realize that we have to you know as herbalists do this campaign of of of educating people and showing them you know I think the biggest issue is that people don't think herbs work because at some point or another they've tried them and they didn't work for them.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_00: And normally that's because people try to use far uh they try to use herbs as pharmaceuticals and that's not how herbs work at all.
• 36:26
  SPEAKER_00: Herbs do not work as pharmaceuticals but we've been trained for decades and decades to believe that everything has to work like a pharmaceutical and it doesn't.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_00: That's not how it works.
• 36:37
  SPEAKER_00: And so in herbalism we're treating a whole body with pharmaceutical and modern medicine we're treating one symptom we're not actually treating the whole body and so my my biggest campaign has been trying to get people to realize that and you know once people do realize that they're like oh my gosh you were right you weren't crazy you know and it's just literally retraining people to think the way that we should have always been thinking and um yeah it's I love that you said that because it's true.
• 37:07
  SPEAKER_00: I mean some of the biggest people who are for food freedom and health freedom and all this stuff are like well herbs you know we're not gonna talk about that.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah yes it can be very frustrating now now on the flip side of that there can be sourcing issues.
• 37:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yes right right there's adulterated herbs out there and whatnot so you do need to be very careful with where you source or buy from um but that's another reason why I love your book is because you you know to to really trust that herb and get the most um you know for you to feel very comfortable with it right if you're afraid of the whole regulation issue then you can easily grow your own and you've laid that out in a step-by-step manner in your book about how anybody can grow them even if you're in an apartment right you don't you don't need a lot of space yeah you don't need a lot of space so herbs can be a little tricky um when growing and so it is it is similar to vegetable gardening but it's a little bit different because they can be a little more finicky and a lot of herbs that you may want to use might not grow in your grow zone.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_00: So you know like the Andrographis tincture that I showed you in the beginning that doesn't grow here.
• 38:21
  SPEAKER_00: I can't grow that unless it's in a heated greenhouse.
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_00: And so you'll have to keep that in mind.
• 38:25
  SPEAKER_00: I can't tell you how many people I had um email me saying where do I get seeds to grow this I'm like where do you live?
• 38:32
  SPEAKER_00: Because you probably can't grow it unless you live in like India or something you know and um and so yeah I lay it out in the book and just even online in general where we go through the growing process um you can grow them even in just pots on your deck.
• 38:48
  SPEAKER_00: You know if you live in an apartment and you have a deck or a little patio you can just literally plant them in pots.
• 38:55
  SPEAKER_00: Chamomile does great in pots time oregano most of the your culinary herbs will grow wonderfully in in a raised bed or pot setup.
• 39:05
  SPEAKER_00: And um you know there are some other herbs that depending on the height in your area but I want to encourage people too to utilize wild foraging because even if you can't grow something where you are doesn't mean it's not already growing readily for you somewhere else.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_00: And so and that's always fun you know you can get permission to forage on another person's property or you might see it on the roadside.
• 39:31
  SPEAKER_00: Just don't don't forage right on the roadside because there's chemicals and stuff from the road that kind of flow right directly off the road but you can really grow herbs anywhere.
• 39:41
  SPEAKER_00: You can even set up uh you know a light room setup in your home if you want to grow them inside um I don't have one I've thought about getting one and setting it up down here just to grow herbs all year long.
• 39:54
  SPEAKER_00: But um my what I like to do is I like to grow herbs spring through summer and fall.
• 39:58
  SPEAKER_00: And then I try to grow enough where I can get one of these big half gallon mason jars full of that one particular herb.
• 40:06
  SPEAKER_00: And it doesn't take a lot I mean it it truly does not take a lot your the reality is that if you are generally a healthy person and obviously you want to be healthy by changing your diet and not being stressed out and you know taking those precautions the reality is that you won't really need a lot of herbs all year long.
• 40:26
  SPEAKER_00: You know you would you would want to put together some preparations and protocols for virus season and cold and flu season, you know, um but you can do that with tinctures you know you can make tinctures tinctures last for five years 20 years however long you can you can have them as long as they don't get contaminated.
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_00: And um so you don't have to grow all the things in order to you know have a good apothecary going.
• 40:54
  SPEAKER_00: And so once I grow something whether it's on you know whether it's in the ground or or you know one of my favorite ways to grow it is like in a flower garden.
• 41:01
  SPEAKER_00: If you have even just a small space in in your flower garden to kind of intermingle herbs with flowers that's a really great way it's also a great pest deterrent a lot of herbs have pest deterring properties um so you can plant them among your garden if you have a larger space but um yeah you can grow herbs anywhere if you if you can't grow them you can wild forage for them if you can't do that or you don't want to do that you can always purchase them online.
• 41:27
  SPEAKER_00: I would just highly recommend that you purchase organic herbs um you can buy from places like Starwest Botanicals or a lot of places now have um you know local herb shops where you can you know buy your dried herbs from herb shops.
• 41:44
  SPEAKER_00: You know just sourcing them from an organic source and a well-known source is really important.
• 41:51
  SPEAKER_00: That way you're not the last thing you want to do is buy herbs that have been sprayed for you know pests and then you're just putting that chemical right into your body.
• 41:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah that's an excellent point.
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah all my herbs that I buy are always organic and actually I have found um fresh herbs at my local grocery store I order organic produce through Miss Fitzmarket and um imperfect foods and they'll often also have um organic fresh herbs like I just ordered some rosemary sage and thyme just the other day.
• 42:25
  SPEAKER_01: And it's a really great project to do with your children too to get them introduced into herbs and um I like to have my my my um children take the fresh herb like the rosemary and kind of pet it and then smell their hands and the oil gets on their hands.
• 42:39
  SPEAKER_01: I mean it's just it's a beautiful aroma to have around the case too like I love cooking with the fresh herbs.
• 42:46
  SPEAKER_01: And I I encourage people to do that as much as possible throughout the year cooking with all different kinds of herbs.
• 42:52
  SPEAKER_01: I wanted to show real fast um just a quick little demo in case somebody is wondering like how hard is this right like it kind of it's sounding complicated again.
• 43:05
  SPEAKER_01: So um I wanted to show what I one thing I do with an essential oil with its frankincense and then right before we wrap up I was hoping that Amy can share with us some of her favorite herbs for cooking um so frankincense is one of my favorite essential oils yeah this one I found um when I was chronically sick with you know I had a debilitating um debilitating uh form of rheumatorin arthritis where I couldn't even like wrap my hand around a cup I couldn't get off the floor couldn't stand up long enough to do like dishes after lunch so I found frankincense and this thing I love frankincense it has biblical reference right it was the wise man brought it to to Jesus when he was born I figure if it was good enough for Jesus it's good enough for me absolutely frankincense It can be used for pain, which I'll show you how I did that, but it's also used for so many of these inflammatory diseases because it is an anti-inflammatory.
• 44:12
  SPEAKER_01: So whether you're talking about like Alzheimer's disease or depression, cancer, diabetes, hepatitis, you know, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson, it has applications for all of these inflammatory diseases.
• 44:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um, oh, and it can even help fight off wrinkles.
• 44:29
  SPEAKER_01: So there you go.
• 44:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's used a lot in um, you know, in cosmetics too.
• 44:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 44:35
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, so this is what I do.
• 44:37
  SPEAKER_01: I have these um amber-colored glass bottles.
• 44:41
  SPEAKER_01: It holds about two teaspoons.
• 44:43
  SPEAKER_01: And um I dilute it.
• 44:44
  SPEAKER_01: I dilute my all my oils.
• 44:46
  SPEAKER_01: Um, like I said, some of them you don't have to dilute, but this one I do dilute.
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's very potent.
• 44:52
  SPEAKER_01: And then I take, I dilute it with fractionated coconut oil.
• 44:55
  SPEAKER_01: All right, my body loves coconut oil, and that's also an antimicrobial, right?
• 44:59
  SPEAKER_01: Coconut oil.
• 44:59
  SPEAKER_01: So what I do is I just pour, I fill up the bottle, it's about two teaspoons of fractionated coconut oil.
• 45:08
  SPEAKER_01: And I just fill it right up, and then I take my frankincense and I just drop in about 15 drops of the oil.
• 45:19
  SPEAKER_01: And that's, you know, I communicate with my body to figure out what does it want.
• 45:25
  SPEAKER_01: And so I ask it, how many drops do you want?
• 45:28
  SPEAKER_01: And that's how I make mine.
• 45:29
  SPEAKER_01: And then the bottles come with these little roll-ons, these plastic, and you just pop it right in there and mix it up, and you literally just roll it on.
• 45:38
  SPEAKER_01: So when I was having this pain from arthritis, my right arm, my whole right forearm, would be in such debilitating pain.
• 45:45
  SPEAKER_01: Like I said, I couldn't grab a cup.
• 45:47
  SPEAKER_01: So, what I would do is take my diluted frankincense and I would just rub it all over my forearm like this, and then I would kind of massage it in.
• 45:56
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes I my husband had to massage it in because this hand was also hurting so much.
• 46:01
  SPEAKER_01: And I kid you not, it it if it doesn't take away all the pain, because it depends on the severity of the pain at the time.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_01: If it didn't take away all of it, it at least took the edge off the pain so that I could tolerate it and I could move through my day and use my hands again, you know.
• 46:17
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 46:17
  SPEAKER_01: Um so that's it, that's how easy it can be to use these types of essential oils, right?
• 46:23
  SPEAKER_01: That wasn't hard.
• 46:23
  SPEAKER_01: I didn't have to cook anything.
• 46:25
  SPEAKER_01: I bought the organic essential oil from a source that I trust.
• 46:28
  SPEAKER_01: I bought organic fractionated coconut oil and mixed them together and voila, it's done.
• 46:34
  SPEAKER_01: And this is, I mean, this is shelf stable for like years, you know.
• 46:38
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 46:39
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so it can be really easy to use them.
• 46:41
  SPEAKER_01: And by the way, if you're listening on the podcast, I've included a link in this description to the video.
• 46:48
  SPEAKER_01: You might want to check out the video, then you can see the visuals of what we're talking about.
• 46:51
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 46:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um, yeah, and that's a really good visual too, because that's that's how everything works.
• 46:57
  SPEAKER_00: And so what happens is there are different routes, no matter what you're using, whether it's a pharmaceutical or an herb, uh, an essential oil, that your body absorbs medicine is essentially how it is.
• 47:08
  SPEAKER_00: And so, if you know, think about it, if your body is absorbing that essential oil, it's also absorbing lotions that you put on, it's absorbing body wash, it's absorbing a lot of things.
• 47:18
  SPEAKER_00: And so, and for different things, it has different absorption rates.
• 47:21
  SPEAKER_00: And so what happens is the same happens with herbs.
• 47:24
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, you you take the herb, whether it's in pill form or whether it's a tincture under your tongue, um, which is my favorite way to do it because your blood immediately um absorbs that tincture, or like you just showed, the oil on your skin.
• 47:38
  SPEAKER_00: And then so you you take that drug or pharmaceutical or herb, and then your body absorbs it, and then from there it metabolizes it, it distributes it, and then afterwards it excretes it.
• 47:48
  SPEAKER_00: And so um it's really important.
• 47:51
  SPEAKER_00: I love that you did that because it kind of can get people thinking, well, if if that essential oil is so powerful that it helps ease pain, then what other things am I using that I probably shouldn't be using and that I can replace with herbs?
• 48:07
  SPEAKER_00: And that's why I did that portion of my book.
• 48:09
  SPEAKER_00: I talk about using making homemade deodorant, making homemade lotions, homemade saps, even like a homemade um antibacterial ointment that you can make instead of using the synthetic like neosporin and all that.
• 48:23
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, so it's just you can literally live an herbal lifestyle very easily and be overall healthier just from getting rid of those toxic products as well.
• 48:36
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 48:36
  SPEAKER_01: I love that.
• 48:37
  SPEAKER_01: So let's let's share some of the things that we like.
• 48:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I have just a few visuals that I brought.
• 48:42
  SPEAKER_01: So I love how you talked about making deodorant.
• 48:45
  SPEAKER_01: So I make my own toothpaste.
• 48:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 48:48
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, our whole family uses this, it's um it's just coconut oil, bentonite clay, um, and I add clove essential oil to it, right?
• 48:57
  SPEAKER_01: Which is um antibacterial.
• 48:59
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 48:59
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so it does help like prevent cavities.
• 49:01
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes I'll throw in a probiotic if if we need it, um, but I use clove for this.
• 49:07
  SPEAKER_01: Um, by the way, I also used when I had such a severe form of candida over road, it was off the charts, right?
• 49:15
  SPEAKER_01: I actually used um clove and oregano, and I took them orally, um, but a very short period of time.
• 49:24
  SPEAKER_01: And I checked in with my body first to figure out which one do you want to take today.
• 49:28
  SPEAKER_01: So I would alternate between the two.
• 49:30
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, Amy and I are not recommending you just start ingesting as well.
• 49:34
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 49:35
  SPEAKER_01: There's like it's one thing to even just infuse them in the air, it's a whole other thing to start ingesting them.
• 49:40
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 49:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um, Amy in her book has some safety precautions on on how to take these, you know, herbal remedies and whatnot.
• 49:48
  SPEAKER_01: So always check in with a reliable source first before you start ingesting things.
• 49:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um I'll share another one of mine, and then if you want to tell us some of yours that you like.
• 49:57
  SPEAKER_01: One thing I love is um it's this powder.
• 50:01
  SPEAKER_01: It's called it's like a people's paste.
• 50:05
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 50:05
  SPEAKER_01: So it has myrrh, slippery elm, um, and golden seal powder.
• 50:10
  SPEAKER_01: Um so it's similar to like what Yarrow would have done, you know, in ancient times when the warriors well no, I'll let you tell that story.
• 50:16
  SPEAKER_01: I love the story of Yarrow.
• 50:18
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but I keep this in my first a kit, this people's paste, and it's used to help stop bleeding and speed wound healing.
• 50:25
  SPEAKER_01: So this is fantastic, especially if you have little kids.
• 50:28
  SPEAKER_01: And you're like out on the playground or you know, at a name.
• 50:31
  SPEAKER_01: Jump some yarrow on there.
• 50:32
  SPEAKER_01: That's great.
• 50:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, I do that all the time.
• 50:34
  SPEAKER_01: I just and it's so great because it's a powder, it you know, it it's not like it has a long shelf life.
• 50:40
  SPEAKER_01: And um, whenever they get a scrape or something, um, there's there's some bleeding there, I just pack it right on.
• 50:47
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, um, it stops the bleeding.
• 50:49
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, um, quick story about my dog.
• 50:51
  SPEAKER_01: One of, you know, I have five dogs.
• 50:53
  SPEAKER_01: One of them got into a fight with a mountain lion.
• 50:55
  SPEAKER_01: Nice.
• 50:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, here back in in our in our um forested area and got like this big scratch, like a big gouge taken behind his ear, and it was bleeding.
• 51:06
  SPEAKER_01: And I was like, oh no, I'm gonna have to take him to the vet, they're gonna want to give him antibiotics.
• 51:10
  SPEAKER_01: So instead, I took the yarrow and just packed it and kept packing it and packing it um in that area and not letting him disturb it.
• 51:18
  SPEAKER_01: And it completely healed it.
• 51:20
  SPEAKER_01: You know, it's not only wound healing, it stops blood, but it's antimicrobial, so it helps, you know, to prevent any kind of infection from forming in there.
• 51:28
  SPEAKER_01: But um, okay, before I get into some stuff I cook with, you go ahead.
• 51:32
  SPEAKER_01: Time for you to do share and tell.
• 51:35
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so specifically for cooking with um, thyme is one of the herbs I I feel like I put time in everything.
• 51:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, a lot of people don't realize that we have parasites in our body, and sometimes they can be bad parasites, and time is naturally antiparasitic.
• 51:53
  SPEAKER_00: And so any chance that I can get um thyme into us, which this time of year is very easy because I'm constantly making bone broth.
• 52:01
  SPEAKER_00: And so I just load up bone broth with thyme.
• 52:05
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so thyme is a good one that I use all the time, and garlic.
• 52:08
  SPEAKER_00: Garlic is a natural antibacterial, and so garlic is really good for um, you know, I like to talk about garlic because it helps prevent secondary infections.
• 52:20
  SPEAKER_00: So if you were to get sick with a respiratory infection, oftentimes it's not the virus that that you can die from or be hospitalized from, it's the secondary infection of pneumonia.
• 52:32
  SPEAKER_00: And so garlic is a really good um herb to get into your daily remedy if you're already taking it.
• 52:39
  SPEAKER_00: Your body already knows it very well and can react to it well.
• 52:42
  SPEAKER_00: So thyme and garlic are the two biggest ones.
• 52:44
  SPEAKER_00: And then I also like to keep sage on hand.
• 52:47
  SPEAKER_00: Sage is a really good um herb for a throat gargle or just your overall body in general.
• 52:54
  SPEAKER_00: It helps um as you know, with especially with strep throat or a sore throat just from nasal post-nasal drip.
• 53:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um, drinking a tea with sage or just eating something with sage in it really helps get that.
• 53:06
  SPEAKER_00: You know, in the winter time, you wake up kind of sometimes you got a sore throat.
• 53:10
  SPEAKER_00: Whether for us, it's the wood stove.
• 53:12
  SPEAKER_00: Um, the wood stove dries us out.
• 53:14
  SPEAKER_00: And so that sage really helps us with that as well.
• 53:16
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, you can use basic kitchen herbs to start with, and you know, adding them into your daily diet just to give you an overall better immune system.
• 53:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, and I I want to stress this too, because this is a a common misconception.
• 53:33
  SPEAKER_00: Like, there is also fake science out there, too.
• 53:37
  SPEAKER_00: You know, there are also people who are literally just creating websites and creating these herbal remedies that are probably not going to work.
• 53:44
  SPEAKER_00: And so it's really important to remember that as well.
• 53:46
  SPEAKER_00: You need to tell the difference between real herbalism and you know false herbalism.
• 53:53
  SPEAKER_00: Um, where was I going with that?
• 53:56
  SPEAKER_01: But well, I will add in there, um, for someone who's just starting, it can be very difficult to be able to identify the real from the from the snake oil, basically.
• 54:05
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 54:06
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's one reason why Joel and I asked Amy to come on the program is because she's, you know, she's a friend of Joel, she's a trusted source.
• 54:14
  SPEAKER_01: You know, we trust her book, we trust her research that she's done.
• 54:19
  SPEAKER_01: She, you know, if you want to start, her book is a great place to start because you know that it is it she's speaking truth.
• 54:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and she's not gonna, you know, intentionally set you astray, right?
• 54:31
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and you can also, like I said, check out her website where you know, see, see if Amy's message resonates with you.
• 54:38
  SPEAKER_01: You know, read her blog, look at her recipes.
• 54:41
  SPEAKER_01: But starting from someone like that who you can trust, you start to understand herbalism better.
• 54:48
  SPEAKER_01: And then you can start to exercise and have the ability to discern between what's true and what's not true.
• 54:55
  SPEAKER_01: So that's an excellent point, Amy.
• 54:56
  SPEAKER_01: Excellent point.
• 54:57
  SPEAKER_01: Um, yeah, um, I want to add to that.
• 55:00
  SPEAKER_01: So, one that most of the many people probably already use is onion.
• 55:04
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 55:04
  SPEAKER_01: Onion is a great herb.
• 55:06
  SPEAKER_01: It actually can fight cancer, it can help control blood sugar levels, uh, helps with digestion, helps fight off infections, it can um actually even boost bone density.
• 55:16
  SPEAKER_01: So I cook with onions a lot.
• 55:18
  SPEAKER_01: Another one that I love is turmeric.
• 55:20
  SPEAKER_01: This is turmeric root.
• 55:22
  SPEAKER_01: I like to try to consume it in its natural form as much as possible.
• 55:27
  SPEAKER_01: Um, turmeric is fantastic.
• 55:29
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's a potent anti-inflammatory, and we have this is one of the most studied herbs now, right?
• 55:35
  SPEAKER_01: We have so much data on this in the scientific literature that we know it helps with pretty much every inflammatory autoimmune condition that you can think of.
• 55:44
  SPEAKER_01: So depression, cancer, diabetes, arthritis, heart disease, you name it, right?
• 55:48
  SPEAKER_01: This can actually help you by lowering the inflammation.
• 55:53
  SPEAKER_01: And then I'll share one more um ginger, right?
• 55:56
  SPEAKER_01: Love, love, love, love ginger.
• 55:58
  SPEAKER_01: This is ginger root.
• 56:00
  SPEAKER_01: Um, not only does it help with digestive issues like reducing nausea and vomiting, soothing your digestive tract, but um, it's also um can help with other inflammatory diseases too, like strokes and um heart disease, lung cancer, diabetes.
• 56:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and it's very easy to cook with.
• 56:19
  SPEAKER_01: I like to consume them in their raw form as much as possible.
• 56:22
  SPEAKER_01: So an easy thing that I do on my salads, I take a potato peeler and I um it okay, this is not the most efficient way to get these peels off, I bet, because I'm I'm taking some of the good stuff, but it's fast, right?
• 56:36
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm all about effective and fast in the kitchen.
• 56:39
  SPEAKER_01: I take a potato peeler and I peel the skin off, and then I'll literally just potato peel it into my salmon.
• 56:45
  SPEAKER_01: And then the same with the ginger.
• 56:47
  SPEAKER_01: And right there, you've got a raw form of these great um anti and they have antioxidants, they're anti-inflammatory, and bam, you've got your herbal intake for you know, um, in that meal.
• 57:00
  SPEAKER_01: And like I said, it's also gonna help boost your the good microbes in your microbiome, reduce your systemic inflammation.
• 57:06
  SPEAKER_01: So there are easy ways that you can incorporate these herbs and essential oils into your into your diet and lifestyle if you want.
• 57:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and just keep in mind that turmeric and ginger can be really spicy.
• 57:19
  SPEAKER_00: So I so in this Android graphis tincture that I made, there's also turmeric in that.
• 57:24
  SPEAKER_00: And so I had a student um email me and she's like, oh my gosh, I can't even take it.
• 57:29
  SPEAKER_00: It's so hot and bitter.
• 57:32
  SPEAKER_00: And because Android Graphis is called the king of bitters, is is another name that goes by.
• 57:36
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, oh, I'm so sorry because I'm just used to to taking stuff like that.
• 57:40
  SPEAKER_00: And so, you know, if you ever find that you can't um stand something as you get started in this, one of the things I like to do is add honey, like raw honey.
• 57:50
  SPEAKER_00: Raw honey has amazing medicinal benefits as well.
• 57:52
  SPEAKER_00: And to go back to your onion statement, um, this is something I just taught in a class.
• 57:57
  SPEAKER_00: Onion, everybody has onion, right?
• 58:00
  SPEAKER_00: Normal people normally have an onion sitting around.
• 58:02
  SPEAKER_00: Normal, normal people.
• 58:05
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 58:06
  SPEAKER_01: It's true, but normal now.
• 58:07
  SPEAKER_01: We're we're outside of that.
• 58:09
  SPEAKER_00: I know, I know, but onions are great.
• 58:12
  SPEAKER_00: You can literally slice up an onion and put it in a jar and then cover it with honey, like raw honey, not store-bought honey, and you let it set overnight and then strain off the the liquid into another jar, and it's a really effective cough syrup.
• 58:27
  SPEAKER_00: Um, it's you know, it's you see in the world of social media, you see stuff like this online and you're like, oh, these stupid people, onion and honey don't work, but but it really does, depending on the type of cough that you have.
• 58:40
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, onion and honey is a really effective cough syrup, especially for kids.
• 58:44
  SPEAKER_00: It might not taste so great, but um, it's something as simple as that that you can do and you can make at home and try it.
• 58:53
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you would just want to take it really frequently.
• 58:55
  SPEAKER_00: But I love that you brought up onion because um that reminded me to talk about that really simple cough syrup.
• 59:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and that's that's such a great example because things are so simple.
• 59:03
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm glad you brought up about um the potency, you know, it to your palate.
• 59:08
  SPEAKER_01: Because yes, um, so I love like for me, black pepper is spicy, right?
• 59:13
  SPEAKER_01: I I can't even tolerate black pepper.
• 59:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and some of the herbs are really easy for me to incorporate, like rosemary and thyme and oregano.
• 59:21
  SPEAKER_01: These are to me, these are like mild herbs, right?
• 59:24
  SPEAKER_01: They're very packed full of flavor and health benefits, but they're mild.
• 59:27
  SPEAKER_01: Things like turmeric and ginger, when because they're when you eat them raw, they can be very um powerful to on your palate.
• 59:36
  SPEAKER_01: So one thing that I did was um I make salads in a jar.
• 59:40
  SPEAKER_01: So I'll make like seven salads at a time.
• 59:42
  SPEAKER_01: And what I do, but even if you don't want to do that, what you can do is when you make up your salad dressing, or if you've bought salad dressing from the store, um, you can do the potato peeling of the turmeric and the ginger, or you can put them into smaller pieces by using a fine grater, like a fine cheese grater, and just grate it, and then you stick it in the salad dressing and you let it kind of marinate in there and it diffuses into the oils in there.
• 1:00:09
  SPEAKER_01: And to me, it takes away some kind of some of that pungent flavor.
• 1:00:14
  SPEAKER_00: It does, yeah, it does.
• 1:00:15
  SPEAKER_00: It'll still be you know different than what you're you're used to if people aren't used to to take uh to taking something like that.
• 1:00:21
  SPEAKER_00: But that is another herbal remedy, you know.
• 1:00:23
  SPEAKER_00: We we make something like fire cider, which is putting turmeric and ginger and jalapenos and lots of hot herbs like that into apple cider vinegar, and then we let it sit for four weeks, and then you can take that as an immune stimulator.
• 1:00:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but it does take some of the bite off when you're infusing.
• 1:00:42
  SPEAKER_00: And it's so funny because I wish I had a visual of this.
• 1:00:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um, like when I when I put my turmeric in the bottom of this tincture, it was so pretty.
• 1:00:50
  SPEAKER_00: It was just this bright orange color against this dark green tincture, but within 24 hours, the orange was completely gone of the turmeric.
• 1:00:59
  SPEAKER_00: So the turmeric is that natural orange color, and that's because the alcohol and the tincture had already extracted all of that out of the turmeric in just that short amount of time.
• 1:01:07
  SPEAKER_00: And so, you know, it's just so fun to watch herbs work that way.
• 1:01:11
  SPEAKER_00: And so, yeah, when you make a salad dressing, it does, it infuses it into the salad dressing, it makes it a little more palatable.
• 1:01:17
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's fantastic.
• 1:01:19
  SPEAKER_01: So, um, Amy, I've kept you longer than I said.
• 1:01:22
  SPEAKER_00: You're fine.
• 1:01:23
  SPEAKER_01: Let's close out by, you know, you've mentioned this virus program that you've created.
• 1:01:28
  SPEAKER_01: Tell us a little bit about that and how we can get it.
• 1:01:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so you know, a lot of people have gotten my book over the last couple of years, and now those students, I call them students because that's what they are.
• 1:01:40
  SPEAKER_00: Like we're all students.
• 1:01:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um, they have they want more.
• 1:01:44
  SPEAKER_00: And so there's only so much you can talk about in a book.
• 1:01:46
  SPEAKER_00: And so I've created this kind of series of of courses, and I call them the Homestead Herbalist courses.
• 1:01:53
  SPEAKER_00: And so the very first mini course in the series is uh about viruses.
• 1:01:59
  SPEAKER_00: So we go over the common cold, influenza, and even just you know, the novel virus of 2019.
• 1:02:06
  SPEAKER_00: And um, basically, I walk students through, like I said earlier, how does the body work?
• 1:02:12
  SPEAKER_00: How does the body absorb herbs?
• 1:02:14
  SPEAKER_00: What are the best ways to take them?
• 1:02:16
  SPEAKER_00: It takes some of the we even have a whole dosage module because you know, a lot of people want to dive into herbalism, but they're like, how do I even begin to dose myself or dose my children?
• 1:02:26
  SPEAKER_00: Pediatric dosing can be really scary sometimes, and understandably.
• 1:02:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so we go through that to kind of take the fear out of that.
• 1:02:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and then it actually goes through 13 plus remedies and protocols that you can put together that I've put together for you, that you can make alongside of me in the in the lessons, um, from tinctures to teas to elderberry syrup, firesider, we just go through a lot of different remedies that you can keep on hand and make in advance, or even right now for cold and flu season, because a lot of times people they start diving into herbalism when they're sick, and and that can be a little bit too late.
• 1:03:06
  SPEAKER_00: And so, my my concept behind this course is that if people can learn how viruses work, which is we don't have enough education on that, especially over the last year.
• 1:03:17
  SPEAKER_00: If people can actually learn how they work, then they're equipped with that information to prevent viruses from happening in their home.
• 1:03:25
  SPEAKER_00: And then if they do happen, they're equipped with really solid scientific evidence-based information on how to get rid of that virus and prevent secondary infections, not just for themselves, but also their children.
• 1:03:38
  SPEAKER_00: And so it's a it's a quick little course, it's jam-packed with information.
• 1:03:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you can find it on my website.
• 1:03:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and tell us again what's your website?
• 1:03:47
  SPEAKER_00: It's just thefuelhomestead.com.
• 1:03:49
  SPEAKER_00: So my last name is spelled f-e-w-e-l-l, thefuelhomestead.com.
• 1:03:53
  SPEAKER_00: And then there's a little tab at the top that says courses, and you can click on that and find more.
• 1:03:58
  SPEAKER_01: That's fantastic.
• 1:03:59
  SPEAKER_01: Well, Amy, thank you so much for joining us and for educating us about herbalism and sharing your insights.
• 1:04:06
  SPEAKER_01: We love your book.
• 1:04:07
  SPEAKER_01: Um, anybody out there who is just starting um in herbs or wants to start with herbs, or you've dabbled in it a little bit and you want to go to the next step, or you just want to feel more comfortable and confident in your herbal practice, uh, we recommend getting Amy's book.
• 1:04:23
  SPEAKER_01: And we'll put a link to the book at the bottom in the description box.
• 1:04:28
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much, Amy.
• 1:04:29
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks so much for having me.