To truly understand and appreciate the healing potential of herbal medicine, we must keep firmly in mind the key differences between herbal medicines and pharmaceutical drugs, and the advantages of the natural herbal approach. The main advantages are:
Herbs work with Nature, not against it.
Herbs work by enhancing the natural physiological functions and defensive healing reactions of the organism.
Many modern medicines, on the other hand, suppress key bodily functions and block these natural healing reactions.
Over the long term, this negative approach wears down the inherent vitality and resistance of the organism.
Herbs are gentler, safer, and have far fewer negative side effects.
The negative side effects of pharmaceutical drugs cause thousands of unnecessary deaths every year.
Herbal medicines follow the key Hippocratic precept:
First, do no harm.
Herbs have the nutritive value that synthetic drugs lack
. No pharmaceutical drug that your doctor can prescribe will be able to rebuild your body; only whole foods, nutritional supplements, and herbs can do that.
Many herbs are nutrient-rich superfoods; as whole natural substances, their nutrients are better absorbed and retained by the organism than even the finest natural vitamins, which are fractionated, concentrated extracts.
Herbs have the biological intelligence of the Life Force inherent in them. Herbs are living medicines that can vitalize and energize the organism; synthetic drugs, as lifeless substances, can’t do this.
Also, the biological intelligence inherent in herbs gives many of them a bivalent capacity to adjust or optimize key bodily functions,
like digestion, circulation, metabolism, and immunity.
Synthetic drugs, which lack this biological intelligence, work only in one direction, and their dosages must be closely monitored to avoid excess or overdose.
The wheels of Nature (and herbs) grind slowly, but they work very well. Herbs usually take longer to work than synthetic drugs, but they work naturally, and get to the root of the problem.
Synthetic drugs may give you the quick fix, but this is often deceptive; many times, pharmaceutical drugs merely mask the symptoms, suppress the body’s natural healing processes, and may even drive the root cause deeper into the organism.
The choice is yours: Do you want to be healed slower, but better, or quickly but not as well?
Many herbal therapies are unequaled by synthetic drugs.
There are certain things that only natural herbs can do for the body, which will probably never be matched by any synthetic pharmaceutical drug.
These are:
Hepatoprotective: Balancing, normalizing, and optimizing liver and bile metabolism; regenerating liver cells.
Many herbs benefit the liver, the principal organ of the Natural Faculty, in this way, because they’re only natural. In contrast, many synthetic pharmaceutical drugs have very negative or damaging effects on the liver and are contraindicated with any history of liver disease.
With the liver being one of the most important internal organs of the body, do you really want to subject it to the stress and abuse of pharmaceutical drugs?
Immunomodulatory: Optimizing immune system function by reducing harmful allergic or autoimmune reactions while enhancing positive immune response to protect against infections.
Conventional medicine’s best answer to autoimmune disorders is a global suppression of all immune responses, both good and bad, which impairs the body’s ability to fight infection.
Immunomodulatory activity is a bivalent action of herbs and a manifestation of the biological intelligence inherent in them. Synthetic drugs, which lack this biological intelligence, are incapable of this immunomodulatory activity.
Alternative: Cleansing the blood and lymph and improving detoxification and eliminative organ functioning.
Only herbs can assist the body in its vital cleansing work, and reduce the toxic load on the organism.
Adaptogenic: Adjusting, stimulating, and optimizing the functioning of multiple organ systems to enhance the healing and protective responses of the organism and improving its resistance to stress and disease.
The nonspecific, broad-spectrum action of herbal tonics and restoratives is unmatched by any synthetic drug. Instead of producing negative side effects, herbs deliver multiple side benefits.
