Growing Your Own Herbal Medicine by Chanchal Cabrera

Discover how to use horticulture therapy — gardening and growing plants — to harvest herbs and process them into herbal medicines.

Explore combinations of herbs to grow for a range of concerns — from colds and flu to menopause, indigestion, and insomnia.

Receive tools and methods for practically applying natural healing principles for self-care.

Would you like to literally take your family’s health into your own hands by creating your own herbal medicines from the plants growing in your garden?

Tapping into the inherent healing powers of botanicals, nature, and all that is alive and vital is one of the most effective actions you can take for self-care and radiant health.

You may already be aware of the magical, mystical, and often miraculous ability of plants to heal our bodies, minds, and souls…

After all, for thousands of years, ancient systems of natural healing, such as botanical medicine, Ayurveda, and Chinese medicine, have proven that plants have remarkable healing properties that can help transform your life’s journey.

This knowledge is vital to navigating the many stressors of life, from work to the challenges of aging. Proper use of medicinal plants can help make you more centered, healthy, and vibrant — rebuilding your immune system and detoxifying your organs and tissues.

That’s because herbs replenish and restore your body’s health and vitality by supporting its inherent metabolic processes of strengthening, toning, and rebuilding.

And these healing, transformative benefits are as close to you as your own garden.

Yet that’s not all plants have to offer us. If you enjoy spending time in nature, and basking in the calming and restorative atmosphere of forests, wildlands, and other natural areas, you’ve experienced firsthand that plants can put you into a state of deep communion with the natural world.

Simply being in their presence is healing and rejuvenating. We gain physical and mental benefits from plants while walking in the woods… while tending our gardens… from improved air quality due to trees and plants thriving in the neighborhood… and the list goes on and on.

Plants are the vehicles that bring us the energy of the sun and the nutrients of the soil that we need for life. Understanding their therapeutic powers gives us a deeper cosmological view and a more dynamic relationship with the life force around us.

Medicinal plants in particular can help us cultivate more prana or chi, and heal and harmonize our bodily systems.

Truly, plants are to people as water is to plants — simply indispensable.

Access Nature’s Medicine Cabinet

If you’re looking to deepen your knowledge (or learn for the first time!) how to prepare herbal remedies for yourself and your family, Growing Your Own Herbal Medicine is the ideal way to get started.

It’s easier than you think to grow your own personalized herb garden. You can do it on any scale, from a big farm… through a community garden… through a little box in your front yard… all the way through to your balcony if that’s all you have. With a bit of creativity and imagination, you’d be surprised at how much you can grow no matter what your resources are.

And with basic tools and methods for practically applying the natural healing properties of homegrown botanicals, you may be able to avoid prescription medications for sleep challenges, colds and flus, immune disorders, menopause, indigestion, and other health conditions.

There are an infinite number of ways you can bring plants into your life and use them safely and effectively to enhance your wellbeing. So it’s no surprise that three out of four people in North America use herbal medicines on a regular basis — be it turmeric for arthritis, St. John’s wort for depression, ginkgo for memory, or any of a myriad other herbs to manage and improve their health.

Even common weeds like dandelion, plantain, and horsetail can be effective remedies and have powerful healing effects. Wait a minute… isn’t plantain a weed? Indeed it is, but a big healthy clump of plantain with nice juicy leaves is a medicine chest unto itself… it can dry mucus, clear the sinuses, and so much more.

So says Chanchal Cabrera, a medical herbalist, master gardener, and horticulture therapist with 35 years of clinical experience. And in Growing Your Own Herbal Medicine, Chanchal will share her vast knowledge about how to select, grow, harvest, process, and use simple but effective botanical remedies that allow you to tap into the healing power of the natural world.

For example, there are a number of ways to treat colds and flu with botanicals. Goldenrod and sage are also effective for sinus congestion, clogged-up ears, and stuffiness. Thyme, echinacea, and garlic are also wonderful allies.

If you’d like to use herbs to sleep better, California poppy is an excellent sedative. To banish stress and anxiety, you can rely on blue vervain, valerian, and wood betony. And don’t forget dandelion leaf, a diuretic that can address heart concerns by helping to reduce fluid in the body and also lower blood pressure a bit.

The list of helpful herbs you can grow for women’s health issue is virtually endless. Raspberry leaf, yarrow leaf, and lady’s mantle are especially helpful in managing menstruation, while motherwort is cooling, calms the heart, and reduces the heat of menopause, as does sage. And believe it or not, licorice is an effective hormone-balancing herb.

Not only is growing your own herbal remedies easy and fun, herbs and other plant medicines offer us health, beauty, and the opportunity to create an intimate relationship with the Earth — one based on mutual respect and care.

You’ll do more than learn about these herbal remedies, you’ll actually spend time with Chanchal in her gardens and in the nearby forests via video so you can actually see the numerous herbs, vegetables, and flowers growing there — and explore their identifying features and uses. You’ll also join Chanchal in the dispensary attached to her clinical practice to see where she compounds and formulates medicines for patients.

Come Home to Yourself

Herbs are critical for not just your personal health but for planetary health as well. Connecting deeply with these living, growing “beings” offers you an opportunity to not only better know a plant’s healing qualities and growing requirements, it can nurture your mind, body, soul, and Mother Earth.

Creating your own custom-made herb garden opens you to a healing beyond the physical — one that touches the gardener and growing place. You view the soil and Earth as living organisms, and you are nurturing that which is nurturing you.

What’s more, the plant “kin-dom,” as Chanchal likes to call it, fosters sustainability and builds resilience in communities. And while plants are essentially collections of chemistries, they are also energetic entities, obeying the laws of nature and integrating themselves into an ecosystem that shapes, informs, and nurtures them, and which they in turn shape, inform, and nurture.

Growing your own herbal medicines also makes a political statement by empowering you to be more autonomous and self-reliant. Indeed, the daily use of herbal remedies enables you to better care for yourself, your family, and your community.

And from a spiritual perspective, expanding your herbal wisdom connects you to herbalists and healers throughout the ages who have called upon the healing power of plants.

Ultimately, says Chanchal, when we connect with the deep sentience, wisdom, and healing power within the plant “kin-dom,” our eyes are opened to new realms of knowledge, and we come home to our bodies and our lives in a different way.