How Our Remedies Are Made
In May of 2003 I completed the move from the Upper Westside of Manhattan to a small coastal community of 6000 people in British Columbia, Canada- accessible only by boat or plane. (After a six month stop in Vancouver). As you can see from the photos above of my neighbourhood, this coastal community is surrounded by a pristine temperate rain forest which one of the richest varieties of medicinal plants anywhere in the world. We are blessed with the world’s best “seaweeds” and mosses and lichens , and the moderate climate allows many land-based plants to grow all year round. One of my friends even has a banana plant thriving in their garden but that’s another story for another day. We have also just been blessed with one of the best medicinal mushroom seasons in recent memory with Reishis and Turkey Tails and Chanterelles and many other species popping out everywhere including my own driveway.
I miss living in New York City but being here in the bush surrounded by this magnificent nature and tranquility has profoundly changed both myself and my healing practice forever. I now spend most of my time foraging in the woods and beaches for plants, raiding my friends and neighbours organic herb gardens and making remedies in my lab. I can’t describe how much I’m enjoying all of this.
The bottom line is that I now make 90% of my remedies myself from scratch. I am working with happy, healthy plants picked at the optimal time of their growing cycle. I am using pure, Canadian Artesian spring water for my water-based remedies and Jamaican Overproof rum as my favourite menstruum for my tinctures. I am slow cooking for days the remedies on a wood stove over Douglas Fir and Alder wood in traditional Clay pots. I am making the remedies the old fashioned way like my grandmother and probably your grandmother did. The remedies are prepared by hand , most are never touched by a machine. The only machines I own are a blender and a coffee grinder.
From the time I obtain the plant to the time it leaves for the post office my hands are the only hands that have touched your remedy This continuity of Intent and Attention is vitally important. Although they are still so far behind what Holistic Healers have known for eons, the scientists are starting to catch up. The current understanding of quantum physics states that the presence of an observer has a profound and measurable effect of the object being observed. It has been demonstrated that an object can behave like a wave when no one is looking and then revert to behaving like a particle in the presence of an observer. It has been stated in quantum physics that an object can appear simultaneously in many positions when not being observed but will immediate assume one position in the presence of an observer. It has been proven by experiments that water crystal will change shape to mimic words or thoughts in their vicinity. I won’t get into the merits of quantum physics but if you are interested or skeptical do look into it yourself or watch the film “what the bleep do we know” or go to http://www.whatthebleep.com.
What i will point out is that if the
presence of a casual observer can have a powerful effect on the objects
around them , imagine what the effect of a healer’s intent and
attention can have on remedies and the healing of a patient?
Who makes your remedies, and their intent and focus is just as
important if not more than what’s in a remedy. When I make my remedies
I am focusing on the person the remedy is for and for the ailment/s
it’s meant to heal. I have seen over and over again the difference in
receiving a remedy from a healer versus buying one off the shelf in
which you have had no interaction with the persons who made the
medicine , have no idea where the medicine was made, what condition the
ingredients were in , how the medicine was prepared and the intent
involved.
One of my favourite methods of preparing remedies is to combine an alcohol based tincture with a super concentrated decoction. This way you get all of the alcohol soluble constituents like volatile oils and resins, and you get all of the water soluble constituents like heavy cell-wall polysaccharides. In some cases I’ll even add essential oils to the mix to get the full spectrum of the plant reproduced in remedy form.
The planet is 70% water. Your body is over
80% water. To me it’s vitally important to receive your medicine in
liquid form whenever possible. Not only is it the most natural way for
your body to absorb medicine but water has superior abilities to carry
the energy signature of the plant the medicine was made from.
-Christopher Scipio
Homeopath/Herbalist
African Bush Doctor.
