In the midst of these uncertain times, we’re “All in the same boat, but not all in the same storm.” I wish I could remember who wrote those words, because the sentiment seems to perfectly encapsulate how differently everyone is experiencing the Covid-19 crisis. Personally I am alternating between fear and anxiety (which drives me to excessive production as a way to deflect the unknown) and acknowledging my decades of fatigue and exhaustion already brought on by excess productivity (which calls me to rest and contemplate and dream). As a result of these two states, I’m having bouts of insight that I’m moved to record here for the future shape of my work. However, I don’t want you to think that I am suggesting you should use this time to be, do, or change anything that doesn’t feel appropriate for you now. Even I can’t do that, and these are my thoughts. Just know that in the After Times, these posts will form the foundation of how I want to effect change in the world. Do what you can for yourself now. ![]() For so many years, Pilates and Herbal Medicine have been my 2 separate lives. At first I was overwhelmed with my pilates studio situation, and when that changed it was a relief but I no longer had the independence to be creative. I couldn't break down the gate between these two wellness approaches. My entire pilates career, I’ve been hearing about how surprisingly great pilates clients felt once they got into their practice. At the same time, I’ve been hearing about how amazed herbal clients were that simple plants could change their digestive system, stress responses, mental focus, ability to heal, and more. Now, as I write this, it’s day 16 of my own coronavirus shut down. I’ve only seen my pilates machines maybe twice, while I was picking up some items to try and make workout-at-home videos. And I’ve been seriously contemplating the overlap of movement medicine and herbal medicine. Here’s what I believe: It’s all inputs. Nothing we take in or do “makes up” for past inputs. No amount of exercise “makes up” for sitting most of the day, or eating anything, or dwelling in spite or anger. I don’t believe there’s any subtraction or division or past- there’s only addition, or multiplication, and future. This is what my experience has taught me.
Maybe it's not a good time to introduce a new program. People are stressed. We're experiencing collective anxiety, fear, and trauma. Our routines have been trashed, our freedoms curtailed, our very ability to move restricted.
Maybe it's the perfect time to introduce a new program. Avoidance coping mechanisms mean we spend all day at the computer, or on the couch. Learning how to exercise in our living rooms and basements via Zoom and YouTube leads to unaccustomed tweaks and soreness. So many people adopting the WFH lifestyle are unprepared for the amounts of time they'll spend in a different chair, at a different desk, without the support and customs of their "normal" day in place. I don't know. Maybe it's both. The very fact that we're not supposed to leave our homes means that we should be deliberately trying to move more in them. The very stress we're sinking under has a multitude of outlets in Adaptogens, herbs that help us adapt to stressful environments. The very virus we're threatened with requires us all to look after our immune systems, one of many systems that traditions like Herbalism are very well prepared to build and support. So maybe this isn't for you. Instead, it might be perfect for someone you know. Or it is perfect for you, but there's just too much "I can't even right now" for you to focus. All that is fine. Here's all the details about my new online program that combines movement, herbal medicine supports, private coaching, and small-group learning. I'm calling it Release and Relief: Back and Pelvic Pain Edition You're invited to join, share, or ignore- whatever fits you best.
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In the midst of these uncertain times, we’re “All in the same boat, but not all in the same storm.” I wish I could remember who wrote those words, because the sentiment seems to perfectly encapsulate how differently everyone is experiencing the Covid-19 crisis. Personally I am alternating between fear and anxiety (which drives me to excessive production as a way to deflect the unknown) and acknowledging my decades of fatigue and exhaustion already brought on by excess productivity (which calls me to rest and contemplate and dream). As a result of these two states, I’m having bouts of insight that I’m moved to record here for the future shape of my work. However, I don’t want you to think that I am suggesting you should use this time to be, do, or change anything that doesn’t feel appropriate for you now. Even I can’t do that, and these are my thoughts. Just know that in the After Times, these posts will form the foundation of how I want to effect change in the world. Do what you can for yourself now. ![]() Aren’t these Grape Hyacinth cute? They’re tiny too, just a couple inches high. If you wanted to, could you get your face all the way down to the ground to find out if they’re fragrant? There’s 2 parts to that question- whether you have the mobility to get your face that close to the surface of the Earth without having fallen on it, and also whether your clothes allow for that much movement. Both can be improved upon! The first is something I can help you with. The second is something you choose. Let’s think about the clothes for a second. I went to the Mutter Museum and looked in horror at the misshapen skeleton of a corseted woman. It’s incredible that anyone would have accepted that as not only fashion but proper and essential. ![]() But then I thought about today’s fashion. I am not generally considered fashionable- tasteful, maybe, and sometimes even matching, but certainly not a trend-follower. And yet I own jeans I have to unbutton when I drive. I own boots that could break an ankle, or in fact one pair that could prevent an ankle break they’re so stiff. (They’re the ones that messed up my knee.) I own underwire bras, and too-small underwear, and narrow-shouldered button-down shirts. Clothes that restrict movement are called body casts. That name makes sense, since they hold us back like a medical cast or splint would. And you know what- I love some of them. Those break-an-ankle boots are gorgeous. I traded an entire pilates training package for them years ago, they’re knee high stretch suede by a real designer, and heeled. Amazing. But. I rarely wear them. The concern is really for when we wear our body casts day in and day out. When we train our bodies to lose mobility and support structures, or even damage circulation and lymphatic drainage. What good is, say, getting out in the garden if your pants cut off your lower body blood flow and your bra won’t let you take a deep breath? It’s not like torture, it IS torture! What would it take to allow yourself the freedom to completely move, to have full Range of Motion, at least most of the time? Sure there are special occasions, but what would your life be like if your Usual Occasions gave you access to more movement? Movement is medicine too.
If you’re not sure what you’d even do with more range, then let me introduce you to the Release and Relief online coaching program. We’re learning to release long-held buttresses that have been holding you up while the rest of you couldn’t, and to move with newly aligned muscles. There’s also herbal supports built in, because that stress and GI inflammation isn’t doing your back pain any favors, for example. If you have made the transition into moveable clothing, what has it been like? Yay, a picture story! This is a slide I just showed to my last DIY Herbalism class, when we dug into Immune health and the herbs that act on it.
See, what we’ve got here is a hole in the skin up top, bad guys getting in, the first line of defense trying to contain them, and notifying the rest of the immune cells to the problem. This is a super simple, easy way to see what your immune system is doing against invaders. Much of the time, when it comes to herbs and the immune system, you’ll hear people talk about “immune stimulants” that really get this process moving in overtime. ZoomZoom the defense cells arrive and Kapow! They knock out the baddies, regroup, and speed off to the next Bat Call. It’s a good visual. But I like to question everything, like the assumption that we even have enough good guys to go around in the first place, and what happens if we don’t. (In addition, this kind of Rapid Response team only functions on the say-so of your Stress Levels. Too much stress will actually shut down your immune system- when you’re trying to outrun the Sabre Toothed Squirrel your body doesn’t want to waste resources on a paltry cut finger. And it expects to quit running soon, either because you got away or you didn’t, so we’re not made for the constant high-stress environment we live in today and don’t have a mechanism to keep immune function under chronic stress.) So here’s another story. Imagine you’re cooking pasta and the water level gets a bit low. The water gets thick, sort of gloppy, the noodles aren’t circulating as much as they should to cook evenly. What do you do? You wouldn’t turn up the heat under the pot to get the noodles to cook as much as possible in the remaining water, would you? No! You’d add water to the pot so the system works as it’s supposed to. The same is true of the immune system. Before turning up the heat and stimulating function, we’ve got to make sure we have plenty of immune cells to go around in the first place- fill up the system, if you will (bonus points for actually adding water, those cells float!) “But hoooow?” I hear some of you wail. “I want my immune cells nooooow!” OK, Veruca, we’re coming. If you wade into the crazy world of the internet you’ll find LOTS of head-scratching references to remedies you’ve not only never heard of, but ones that I’ve never heard of either. It’s just not helpful to tell people to find True Indigo Root, or patented TCM formulas, or dozens of other specialized and NOT local-to-whereever-you-are plants. Instead, let’s focus on what we CAN do because these are things people have ALWAYS done. These are all age-old techniques for building the robustness and vitality of your entire self, including your immune system.
Take a deep breath, we'll get through this together There are all kinds of Herbal Medicine makers out there. Let's support them! This is NOT an exhaustive list, and I will be adding to it. Please send your recommendations or drop them in the comments below. Donation RequestsHigh Garden Tea- their Memphis TN shop was completely destroyed by a tornado in early March 2020
The Botanical Bus- a bilingual mobile herb clinic in CA Bay Herbalism- a free holistic and mobile health clinic in Sonoma County CA Commonweath Herbs Free Clinic- in Brookline MA Rootwork Herbals' People's Medicine Project- provides BIPOC a safe, experiential education in working with common plants to help heal themselves and their communities ![]() Ok, yes, technically speaking, “tea” is a beverage made from Black or Green Tea (of the Camellia sinensis plant). Other plants steeped in water, like Chamomile or Peppermint, are properly called a “tisane”. Phooey, I say! They all fall under the grand umbrella of the exalted Herbal Infusion, grandmother of the herbal remedies. All an “infusion” is, really, is plants steeped in liquid for a while. Water, milk, vinegar, oil, wine, vodka... the options are endless. When you hear an Herbalist talk about an Herbal Infusion, it’s generally meant that your herbs were steeped in hot water for anywhere from 20-60 minutes, or up to a few hours. A longer steep like this allows many more plant constituents, the “phytochemicals”, to make their way into the water and shift it from a simple beverage to a medicinal remedy. Yes, this will change the flavor! One of my favorite experiments with students is to serve
Any guesses about how each tastes? DIY Herbalism students, do you remember ALLLL the way back to your first class- what were the 3 teas like?
So what about tea bags vs loose tea? ![]() A simple herbal tea bag, like your Traditional Medicinals Gypsy Cold Care or Tazo Wild Sweet Orange or Yogi Echinacea (just a few of my favs!), usually contains enough plant material to make a nice strong QUART of tea- a simple coffee mug doesn’t do them justice. Besides, you can always drink more than a 4-6oz cup anyway- hydration hydration hydration. Plus, tea-bag tea is usually pulverized, basically a powder, so it infuses much more easily and quickly into hot water than whole or even cut leaves and flowers do. This means you can get away with a shorter steep, maybe 10-15 minutes, than you would want for loose tea- more like 20-60 minutes. That simple tea bag does come at a cost, though. Once reason there’s so much plant material in each tea bag is because the quality can much lower than whole plants. Imagine a Chamomile harvest- the best flowers are sold to the higher priced tea companies, the lesser flowers to cheaper brands, and the fluff that’s left over is scooped up and sold in individual tea bags. Given my druthers I’ll make loose tea every time, but a good quality tea bag for convenience is perfectly good enough
At the other end of the water spectrum are Cold Infusions. Some herbs do much better steeping without heat, usually because of mucilage or aromatics. Fresh herbs like Chamomile, Tulsi, Fennel, Peppermint, Anise Hyssop, Rose- any of the yummy ones, really- absolutely shine in a Cold Infusion. And herbs like Marshmallow, Cinnamon, Linden, and Slippery Elm have a sugar molecule called “mucilage” that gets slimy and gooey in cold water, which is wonderfully soothing to the digestive tract and nervous system. Cold Infusions are even more simple than the hot ones, since you, um, don’t have to heat the water. Just put your plants in your jar, cover with room temperature water, cap loosely, and let sit overnight. If your house is particularly hot you could put it in the fridge, but true cold will slow the mucilage from extracting But what if you want to combine remedies with different times or temperatures? For example, a great combo for an angry gut is Chamomile and Marshmallow, but you’d want a long steeped Chamomile and a cold steeped Marshmallow. What to do?
The answer is- staggering. No, I mean that as a verb, not an adjective! Do this: make your Chamomile tea in a quart jar around dinner time in hot water. Before bed, when it’s cooled off, add the Marshmallow, and wait till morning. Just stagger *when* you add different herbs to create your different combos. Staggering is also a good solution for when you would like to include more gentle notes of strong flavors. Try stirring your tea with a Cinnamon stick, if you don't want an overpowering spice. Or add your Chamomile or Rose petals right before serving, if you want the aromatic bloom. There are so many ways to infuse your plants in just simple water! What are your favorite flavors or techniques? |
Fun Fact: I'm an herbalist and a movement coach. Not a doctor, or a pharmacist, and not pretending to be one on TV.
This is a public space, so my writing reflects my experiences and I try to stay general enough so it might relate to you. This does not constitute medical advice, and I encourage you to discuss concerns with your doctor. Remember, however, that the final say in your wellness decisions are always yours- you have the power to choose, you are the boss of you. And, some of my posts may contain affiliate links. If you make a purchase through them I'll earn a few cents. Thank you for supporting my work. This website is provided for educational and informational purposes only and is not medical, mental health or healthcare advice. The information presented here is not intended to diagnose, treat, heal, cure or prevent any illness, medical condition or mental or emotional condition. Working with us is not a guarantee of any results. Paula Billig owns all copyrights to the materials presented here unless otherwise noted. Categories
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