Feeding Your Inner Sun with St. John’s Wort (Hypericum perforatum)
Stepping into some of the warmest and longest days of the year, we’ve arrived now at the Summer Solstice marking the first days of summer here in the northern hemisphere. Basking in the Suns warmth, it penetrates not only our souls but all the plants and forests around us, bringing an abundance of life, food…
Tending to the Inner Cosmos with Plant Medicine
Last week I had the honor of being interviewed by functional nutritionist and Akashic Soul Record reader, Venessa Rodriguez, for her Feed Your Wild podcast – a conscious lifestyle show about all things nourishing for your body, mind, and soul. Here’s what Vanessa has to share about the interview: “In this episode, Sajah talks about…
Working with Plant Intelligence with Scott Kloos
In this special episode of The Plant Path, I got a chance to interview a fellow PNW herbalist, Scott Kloos, founder of Cascadia Folk Medicine, The School of Forest Medicine and author of Pacific Northwest Medicinal Plants: Identify, Harvest, and Use 120 Wild Herbs for Health and Wellness. Scott and I have known each other…
Understanding Herbs Astrologically
In a similar way that the astrological pattern enables us to see the relationship between the human body, psyche, and soul, so too does it allow us to understand the connection between a plant’s physical, energetic and spiritual properties. It’s common in modern day herbalism to have one particular system for understanding the medicinal properties…
Connecting Our Physical, Psychological and Spiritual Health
As a holistic herbalist, our goal is to work with the WHOLE person. From many traditional perspectives, there are three primary organizational layers of the human being. In Alchemy these are referred to as Salt, Mercury and Sulfur. In Ayurveda it is vata, pitta, and kapha, or prana, tejas, and ojas. The Chinese refer to…
Medical Astrology and Holistic Herbalism
Often when we consider the context of holistic herbalism, we tend to think of using the whole plant to heal the whole person. And by “whole plant,” we aren’t referring to the root, leaf, flower and seed/fruit of the plant, but rather using its holistic medicinal nature: chemistry, energetics and spirit, which will then heal…
How to Heal and Not Harm with Medicinal Plants
As herbalists, our #1 goal in our work is to provide healing and alleviate the suffering in the people we serve. But that typically leads into our #1 fear as herbalists, which is that we might inflict harm or hurt someone with the medicinal plants we give them. This is a totally valid concern, for…
Legal Concerns of Practicing Herbalism
A major concern of folks on the path of becoming a practicing herbalist is that they’ll get sued for practicing medicine without a license. Being an herbalist in the United States is a little bit of a grey area, as there are thousands of practitioners out there helping people with plants that aren’t necessarily licensed…
“How much of an herb do I give?” A discussion on dosage of medicinal plants
From a single drop to 5 mL of tincture or 1 tsp to 5 grams for a cup of tea, the range of how much of a medicinal plant to give someone is as vast and numerous as there are herbalists. Strong opinions exist on both ends of the spectrum; whether to give small…
Herbal Lessons Learned from a House Remodel
Last year my wife Whitney and I moved back to our homeland in the beautiful forests and mountains of northwest Washington. We found a little piece of land with an old farmhouse on it, moved in, looked around, and thought “maybe we should change a few things around on this old place…” Well that one…
