Natural Remedies - A Primer for Usage and Cautions

For thousands of years native peoples have relieved their aches and pains and cured their illnesses with the use of natural remedies instead of scientifically trained, licensed professionals or synthesized medicines. Different cultures have different remedies for different ailments. Community healers picked up on the use of the items in nature that helped their people, and as the world became smaller this information was passed along to other cultures and before long medicine books and literature became a part of every culture. Some cultures use more natural medicine than others and as the more industrialized parts of the world look for ways to return to the soil, natural remedies have become a rallying point.

The increased use of natural remedies has been a sore spot for doctors, drug companies and legislators for years. In efforts to play "Mother and Protector" of the people these large interests have done all they could to play down the effectiveness of natural remedies and play up the benefits of synthesized medicines. The problem with someone playing "Mother and Protector" is that most of the time it is done for purely selfish reasons but it is touted to protect the end user from charlatans and dangerous combinations of natural ingredients. While some oversight is welcome a complete shut down of natural remedy information seems to be the goal for most of these three.

The more you spend time studying natural cures the more you find that the current slew of modern medicines are based on these natural ideas. Antibiotics from different types of mold, headache relief from tree bark, burn and cut ointments from plants and all forms of minor ailments are treated by different teas made from flowers and herbs. If you take the time to follow the ingredients on over the counter medicines you will find that many of the items in them come from natural ingredients but have been replicated in the lab instead of harvested from the field.

Agora Publishing, one of the world's largest consumer publishers, has put together any number of books, reports and newsletters reporting on different medicines used around the world and the good and bad points of natural cures vs. laboratory medicine. One of their best selling books talks about how over the counter medicines like Tagamet (used to be a controlled drug) can actually cause other medicines you take not to work or even make them dangerous. Natural cures, over the counter medicines and prescription medicines each have their place but as in any instance you must be informed about what you put into your body.

Natural cures, over the counter treatments and prescription remedies are not something you can learn about by reading a 400 word article. Never take on treating yourself with anything without the advice of a practiced professional that you trust. By professional it may mean your village healer or your HMO physician but even members of the most primitive tribe in the Amazon jungle does not treat themselves without first consulting a healer. There are more articles than you can shake a stick at that promote one cure over another or put down the use of prescription medicine. Don't take the word of some researcher who wrote an article. One of the main reasons we have such a dependency on medicines in the US is because of the need for a fast answer. Sometimes answers come slowly and from experience and not from McDonald's like drug stores who have a pill for everything including a cure from pills.

The Internet has become the McDonald's of information. You can get anything you want at anytime you want at any price that you want. But that does not make it the right thing for you. Take your time, learn your body and find someone who will teach you and who has your best interests in mind and not their own financial interests. They are hard to find but these healers are out there and many of them have been trained in both traditional and modern treatment modalities.

Health is a lifestyle and lifelong journey and does not come in a bottle.