How are Herbs Different from Pharmaceuticals?

May 12, 2010

Most pharmaceutical drugs today are highly refined and purified, and are often synthetic. They act to suppress our symptoms rather than addressing and fixing the cause. As recent as 1987, roughly 85% of modern drugs were originally derived from plants. Today, it’s only about 15%. Our bodies can’t metabolize these refined and synthetic chemicals, so they wind up building up in our livers and often creating nightmarish problems (to the point of destroyed livers and kidneys, messed up digestive systems and nervous systems, and even death). Pharmaceuticals also create an acidic environment in our bodies and deplete vital nutrients.

As an example of nutrient depletion, in his book Drugs & Nutrient Depletion (ISBN 157636156-x), Pharmacist Clell M. Fowles lists a variety of medications which deplete CoQ10 (including cholesterol-lowering meds, such as Lipitor, meds for high blood pressure, heart meds, and even anti-depressant meds). CoQ10 is a nutrient – a co-enzyme – that we (hopefully) absorb from our diet, but our bodies also manufacture it. However, as we age, we lose the ability to manufacture significant levels. So when you throw in a med that adds further depletion, you’ve just created a very dangerous scenario. Symptoms of CoQ10 depletion include congestive heart failure, angina, mitral valve prolapse, stroke, hypertension (high blood pressure), cardiomyopathy, cardiac arrhythmias, lethargy, gingivitis, and weakened immune system!

Doesn’t it seem a bit strange that a nutrient that is so critical to the cardiovascular system is depleted by the very drugs that are routinely prescribed by doctors for heart conditions? Click here for more information on CoQ10 along with a list of numerous studies.

There are many other examples of multiple nutrients being depleted by a whole broad spectrum of meds …nutrients like zinc, calcium, phosphorus, potassium, magnesium, iron, all of the B vitamins, vitamins A, C, and D, the friendly flora in our digestive tracts, and many others. The list of symptoms associated with these deficiencies is staggering! You get the idea …. but if you would like to become more educated, Drugs & Nutrient Depletion is an excellent source for this information.

In Contrast, herbs work on three levels:

Nutritional (herbs are full of concentrated nutrition …organic nutrition that is bio-available to the human body),
Medicinal (astringing, stimulating, soothing and relaxing), and
Vibratory (energy building, opening, sending, and harmonizing).

Individually herbs are powerful, but when combined with other herbs into a formula, hundreds to thousands of interrelated compounds come into play. It’s the interrelatedness of these compounds that create a synergy that is many times greater than the isolated “active ingredient” from which pharmaceuticals are made. Science is now proving that the safety and effectiveness of herbs is often related to this synergy – a component that cannot be duplicated in pharmaceuticals.

It is common knowledge that viruses mutate and become resistant to pharmaceutical antibiotics, to the point of being useless. Not so with herbs. The chemical and energetic make-up of herbs (their synergy) is so complex that viruses cannot mutate themselves around them!

Posted by Terry | Filed Under Herbal Products, The Big Picture | Leave a Comment

Our Interrelatedness with Nature

May 3, 2010

Try to imagine everything Nature encompasses (if you can!). Let’s look at just one aspect of it – our bodies. Comprehending THAT alone is mind boggling!

How do the 50 to 75 trillion cells that make up a human body know what their individual functions are? How does a cell know whether to be a heart or a gallbladder? A liver or lung? A brain or skin? Heck, how does a cell even know how to divide itself? How do our bodies just automatically know how to breathe or digest our food without our having to think about it? What makes our eyes see and our ears hear? How does a body know how to heal itself?

As you look at just a few of the almost countless functions that our physical bodies do without our even being conscious of it, keep in mind this is only one aspect of being human! We also have the mental, emotional, and spiritual aspects, all of which has its own energetic needs, and contributes its own energetic influence.

Did you know the human heart has its own energy field that projects itself outward from our bodies by several feet? (it is believed to be more, but our scientific instruments are not fine-tuned enough to pick up measurements beyond several feet).

The heart is the seat of our beliefs and emotions. It’s where our general state of being resides … where our very state of consciousness resides. Think about it: If the state of our Being is projecting ourselves out there as an energy field, how must we be affecting everything around us? (as within, so without).

Ever notice how one person can light up a room when they enter? Or how another person can suck the energy right out of the room? Ever hear anyone say “You could have cut the air with a knife” referring to the ‘atmosphere’ in the room during a tense situation? What are you projecting into your world?

Now multiply that by however many billion people there are on the planet, and you have the “collective consciousness” - the collective “as within, so without”. See how that is affecting OUR world? And it starts with each one of us. We each have a responsibility to ourselves, to each other, and to our planet to live from our hearts in communion with our Creator. Not only does that have a very positive effect on humanity, the plants just love it!

… and get this: we’ve all heard that plants respond to our voices and our treatment of them, but did you know that they respond to our very intentions?! (The Secret Life of Plants by Peter Tompkins and Christopher Bird). I find that amazing!

Ok, so those are ways we affect the world around us, but what are some ways the world interacts with us? Here’s a pretty big one: plants and trees produce the oxygen we breathe, absorb the carbon dioxide we produce, and turn it back into oxygen for us again!

Various shapes of plant cells match exactly with the various shapes of human cells … in fact, that’s one of the ways herbalists and other healers used to identify which plants to use for different organs. That method seems a bit crude by today’s standards, but scientists are actually confirming in studies today that those same plants really do contain chemical compounds that are highly effective in promoting healing to specific body systems and organs.

Also, nutrients from plants are in an organic, bio-available form that our bodies can actually assimilate. The fragrances and frequencies of plants have a profound effect on balancing and uplifting our emotions, opening our hearts, and expanding our spirituality.