Many today are choosing to use herbs or plant medicine to address their health concerns. How does one know which herbs to use? Television commercials advise on what medicine to take for symptoms or diseases one may experience. Multiple health advisory sites on the internet will also direct one to use natural products, plant-based supplements, or even advertise herbs that will treat a symptom or disease. 

Do the herbs/supplements you’re taking match your Energetics or constitution?

Today’s herbalists have access to a vast body of information accumulated over thousands of years that help shape our understanding of plants that affect the health and wellbeing of the human body. Traditional Chinese Medicine, Ayurveda, Unani Tibb, Western Herbalism, and multiple indigenous peoples in widespread cultures have provided a system to classify/categorize herbs into functions, properties, or herbal actions. 

Herbal Energetics or herbal actions is just one guide used in the language of herbalists that tell us about temperature (whether a plant is cooling or warming) and moisture (whether a plant is drying or moistening). Herbs are not limited by our systems, and plants can have more than one or two herbal actions. People also have Energetics and are constitutionally warm or cool/moist or dry or may be neutral. When ill or imbalanced an individual can experience warmth or coolness in excess of their constitution. Moisture or dryness can be seen in a specific body function such as a cough that can be moist versus a dry cough. Using herbs that suit your individual health situation is more than applying an herb to symptoms. Most popular symptom-plus-herb combinations are herbs advertised to treat cold and flu symptoms.  

Echinacea is one of the most researched herbs in the US. It has been popularized and promoted as the treatment to use at the onset of cold and flu symptoms. Do you know which species of Echinacea works best? How and when to take it? If it is the right treatment for your health situation? Some individuals should avoid Echinacea.

If you would like to learn more about Echinacea and whether it is right for you, send an email to HELPcare Clinic, and they will pass the request along to me. I look forward to matching you to the best herbs for you.

For fun, check out this herb spoof on TV commercials: