Each drop of tisane is precious.

Each minute of steeping pulls out more medicine.

Learning to be efficient with herbal material 

and not wasting any bit of your efforts or the plants effort, 

and not over consuming is noble.

I like to use my resources wisely.

I also have to be mindful that this can become an unhealthy obsession too.  The dominant paradigm creeps into my herbal wisdom ways and demands rigid efficiency in order to create the “biggest bang for my buck”.  

I still find myself thinking how my herbal extractions aren’t strong enough. They don’t look as good as the other extractions I see from more skilled herbal healers. What kind of herbal maker, herbal healer, plant priestess, herbalist, gardener, etc. am I? If you’re not the best, then get out of the way. Leave it to the experts. These are some of the ways internalized dominant paradigm can emerge in herbal wisdom – competition, superiority, and scarcity.

Yes, each drop of tisane is precious, regardless if I used the “best” or most efficient method (if there is such a thing). 

It’s true that some extraction methods are better at drawing out more plant constituents. Though, do we really need to have the MOST plant constituents in salves, tisanes, and other extractions?  Do I really need it ALL? Maybe 50% is all we need. Maybe extracting 100% of the plant essence isn’t the one-and-only standard. 

Using a holistic paradigm as a lens to view the potency of herbal extractions and remedies, reveals that other factors contribute to the effectiveness of herbal remedies. These factors include: environmental factors, age of the plant at harvest, length and conditions during  storage, supplies available, severity of symptoms, frequency of dosage, overall health conditions of the person taking the herbal remedy, and more. 

As much as I would like to have a 100% predictable formula for each herbal remedy so that I could consistently heal and fix people’s discomforts – it just isn’t that way. Herbs and people are diverse. I love that! It’s a matter of listening to each person as they are and not how a formula says they should be. It’s a matter of connecting to plants as beings instead of as objects that must perform.  

Here’s a reminder to myself. Perhaps it will support you along the way in your journey as a human seeking wellness or as a herbal learner. 

You don’t have to squeeze out every single drop of precious essence to be healing and effective. You don’t have to be the genius , A+, expert herbal maker for herbal remedies to help.

Herbal, plants, or herbal remedy making. It’s not about being the best, smartest, hardest working, strongest, best, fastest, smartest.

Herbal healing, Herbal Healers, Herbal wisdom . . .

is about feeling your way toward the wholeness that makes sense for you,

is about connecting to the plants that grow outside your door,

is about feeling the hope and possibility that is right in front of you . . . and not in some far, unreachable, unattainable place.