The Herbalist's Path
If you’re a mom who loves having your own natural medicine kit, filled with herbal remedies & ingredients you know, love, trust, & can pronounce, then this podcast is for you!
Hosted by Mel Mutterspaugh, a clinical herbalist, holistic health & environmental educator, natural medicine maker, and a mountain livin’ momma on a mission to help more moms learn how to use herbs and plant medicines in a safe and effective way.
In this show, you’ll hear tips and bits on how you can take better care of your family, & better care of our planet, naturally.
We approach herbal medicine by dancing the science, with a bit of the folksy woo stuff too! You’ll hear interviews with other herbalists, naturopaths, doulas, midwives, herb farmers, product makers, holistic healers, and moms of all kinds sharing their wisdom on their journey down this herbalist’s path.
We’re all about inspiring a movement where there’s an herbalist in every home… AGAIN! And that starts with YOU! So, be sure to hit subscribe so you never miss a show, and share it with all your momma friends so we can make herbalism #SpreadLikeWildFlowers
Learn more and check out our classes at theherbalistspath.com
The Herbalist's Path
From Acne to Emotional Balance: Healing the Body with Dr. Linh Love’s Ancient Chinese Medicine Wisdom
In this episode of The Herbalist’s Path, Dr. Linh Love shares her expertise in Chinese medicine and herbal healing. We dive into how emotional balance plays a crucial role in healing hormonal acne and improving overall well-being. Learn practical tips for using Chinese herbs, acupressure, and energy medicine to support skin health and mental wellness.
Key topics: Healing hormonal acne with Chinese medicine, the link between emotions and physical health, and using acupressure and herbs for skin and stress relief.
03:39 Chinese Medicine & Herbalism
14:01 Dr. Lynn's Journey
26:06 Integrating Western & Chinese Medicine
28:08 A Journey to Chinese Medicine
33:59 Diet, Lifestyle & Healing
43:16 Emotions & Organ Connection
47:20 Listening to Your Body
54:01 Empowering Self-Healing
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If you've been trying to figure out the best remedies to have stocked in your natural medicine cabinet, you are in luck! I've got a free guide for you where I'm sharing the best remedies to have for all the things from colds and flu, to tummy aches, sleeplessness, and daily well-being. You can get it right here!
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*The information I’ve provided is for educational purposes only and is not intended to be a substitute for medical treatment. Please consult your medical care provider before using herbs.
Hello and welcome to the Herbalist Path, a podcast where you'll discover how to make your own herbal remedies at home so that you can take better care of yourself, better care of your family and better care of our planet. I'm Mel. I'm a clinical herbalist, environmental educator and mountain-l living mama with this crazy passion for teaching more mamas and their little loves how to use plants as medicine in a safe, effective and tasty way, so that there can be an herbalist in every home. Again, it's an absolute honor to have you on the journey down the herbalist path with me so that together we can make herbalism Hashtag spread like wildflowers. Hello, hello and welcome back to another episode on the herbalist path. Today I have an incredibly special guest for you, which I did. You hear that in the background. I did Not at all. That was my speaker just going, the Bluetooth going off. Sorry, at least it was like right in the beginning.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, all good, that won't happen again.
Speaker 1:Okay, do over, hello, hello and welcome back to another episode on the Herbalist Path. I am so excited for today's episode because I have a very special guest to have a chat with on here and it's Dr Lynn Love. She is an Asian medicine woman. She's a doctor of Chinese medicine, an acupuncturist, a hypnotherapist. She has so much to offer in the whole realm of mind, body, spiritual healing from that Asian medicine perspective, which, as a Western herbalist, gets me really excited because it means I'm always going to learn something fabulous. So, fortunately, I was connected with Dr Lynn through a holistic healing bundle that we did together and we've been meaning to have this chat on my show and on her show for quite a while, so I'm so thrilled to bring it to you now. So, lynn, thank you so very much for coming on the show.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much, Mel and everyone listening. I'm so, so honored to be here with you all.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm sure I missed a lot in that brief little introduction. So if you just want to share a bit about yourself and who you, are?
Speaker 2:Yeah, totally Well. Thank you for that introduction. It's a good reminder of all of the things that I've done. But I am a doctor of Chinese medicine, a licensed acupuncturist, I'm an herbalist and an Asian medicine woman. I'm also so so many things, but I truly feel like a magician in many ways. I wear many, many hats, and one of the things that I have been very connected to lately is the doctor role, because the ancient traditions knew that doctor meant teacher and educator, and so I've been very much connecting with that responsibility, that role in myself as educator and teacher, and sharing a lot about Chinese wisdom Chinese medicine, vietnamese medicine and it's just been lighting me up so much to be able to share that wisdom with all of us here, because that knowledge is here to empower us to live as our most healthiest, most vital selves.
Speaker 2:So, yes, I, early on in my life, I learned Chinese medicine. I learned herbalism by watching my mom in the kitchen and I have early like memories of her, like putting herbs in our soup and making rice porridge and putting herbs in there and talking about what my body was doing, about what certain herbs were doing. And you know, as a kid I was kind of like mom, this is like I just want to be a normal kid, like, let me just be normal, let me just like not. But I still loved the way that she she told me about what my body was doing and about what energetics was, and so I kind of had that frame of mind throughout my entire life until I went to Chinese medicine school and became a doctor Chinese medicine and things just clicked.
Speaker 1:Say so many things on your intro, but I really as a mom who now has an 11 year old daughter, who's grown up in an herbal apothecary and herbs have been just her way of life forever. She's now entering that age where it's not so cool and it's mom, why are you talking about this again? But to hear you say that you know you're you remember those pieces as a mother that has brought my daughter up in that way, it makes me truly warm to my heart. Oh, my goodness, think about that warmth. And we think about energetics and how important energetics, from the whole mind, soul perspective, are in the realm of healing. I feel like we could talk about that this entire podcast Totally. We can go to so many places.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely, it's really, really cool. What you said about your daughter actually gave me chills, because you're expanding her to what is possible in this world. You're expanding her to beyond what we're taught in primary school and high school. You're expanding her to what medicine and magic is that has been around for thousands of thousands of years. Like traditional Chinese medicine has been around for centuries helping people in ancient civilizations through all sorts of illnesses, imbalances, epidemics. It's also known as home folk medicine. Like a lot of the traditional remedies that I received when I was young at home was like traditional folk remedies passed down in Vietnamese communities for years and years and years. So like the things that you're sharing are lifelong tools that one day your daughter is going to be able to resource from and use and help people from, and like you're just expanding her to like the possibilities of the magical world of medicine and herbs and plants. So you're doing the work by just sharing with her.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's. That's exactly what it's all about, though, and that's kind of what I have this podcast for and why I do everything that I do so that I can help more moms be able to do that with their children, and we can return to how it has been for centuries, where the elders pass this knowledge and wisdom down from one generation down to the next generation and and beyond, and that is just such an empowering feeling, and thank you for everything you had to say about it. I am a firm believer that that kind of knowledge is far superior to anything you are going to get in the public school system, at least within the United States. Yes, I would rather her grow up with those life skills than memorizing all I mean memorizing.
Speaker 1:Multiplication is important. Geometry, yeah, exactly, but like, how often do we use that stuff in actual life? And it is beautiful to see her as she grows into the being that she is, because, um, honestly, she's one of the most kind and compassionate and caring human beings I've ever met, and I have met a lot of people. She is also very, very reserved and very shy and does not like large crowds of people, and I'm like she's got these magical hands, this really great gift of touch, and when she just is like, oh, mom looks stressed, she just reaches up and starts to massage my shoulders. She's been doing this for since she was like six and like she's really good at it.
Speaker 2:She has many gifts. You are a healer yes, how beautiful is that. And you know, you're reminding me that you know this traditional, ancient wisdom, whether it's through herbs or through energetics, or Chinese medicine, ayurveda. It's like we have to honor the roots of those traditions and how long they've been around, and also we can use that information and that wisdom to then empower the new generations to take care of themselves and change the paradigm of what we know medicine and healing today.
Speaker 2:Because when I was young, my mom, you know I I grew up in like sort of um, I really had both of the dualities Like I would go home and my mom would cook me Chinese herbs and I drink these. Like terrible tasting formulas, herbal formulas, just bitter as heck and like just not taste good. Some of them were really good, like you know some formulas. But and then she would do um, something called Gaoya, which is essentially what we know as Gua Sha. Many people know as Gua Sha, but it's essentially scraping of the skin and that actually clears heat from the body and it's really great, especially when you have colds or when you have a fever. You can kind of scrape along the chest and the back and that actually helps to clear some of the heat which is really great when you have a fever, right, because it kind of helps to just clear some of the energy that's blocking the body from doing what it needs to do and I would go home and get that done and with all sorts of ointments and Chinese herbs, and then she would take me to the Western doctor and I would get my asthma inhaler and you know all the checkups and things, and it was just like two different worlds and I I had a taste of both and actually, funny enough, I really wanted to be a Western medicine nurse, like for a really long time.
Speaker 2:I went to undergrad as a pre-nursing major and was like this is what I'm here to do. I want to be a nurse. So I always knew I was here on this planet to help people heal and to take care of people and to teach people. But I was kind of got sidetracked because I was like, oh yeah, I want to do nursing, this is totally what I want to do. And then I worked in a hospital as an intern, was like this is absolutely not what I want to do. I don't want to be in this hospital setting. I don't, you know I don't really see how people are getting better, right.
Speaker 2:But when I started going back into Chinese medicine school, it just all clicked for me. It all made sense on a very deep, like deep, ancestral, embodied level, where I was like, yeah, like it makes sense that your heart is sending energy to this area and it's all interconnected and energy's flowing and like, even though we can't see chi and life force or prana, it's still animating all things, it's still living in all things. And Chinese medicine is fundamentally an energy medicine that when we shift energy that is blocked in any part of our body, it's going to cause a ripple effect to another part of our body and help that chi to go more in harmony or in balance. And that's sort of the purpose of Chinese medicine and Chinese herbalism as well. It's just moving and aiding and promoting qi flow in the body.
Speaker 2:So I know I totally went into many tangents there, but when we're using things like herbs and simple herbs like ginger or lemongrass or mint, those things are extremely powerful and they're they're working on a very energetic level.
Speaker 2:So from a Chinese medicine perspective, we we see everything in in energy. So when we take things like mint or you make yourself a mint tea. What we're doing is we're clearing heat because the mint actually is very cooling in nature and it enters into our throat. So it's great when we have sore throats we can drink something like a mint tea. Drinking ginger adding ginger to that is helping with the digestion. So it's like we get to create medicine just through our connection with plants and herbs and with this ancient wisdom that has been passed down for centuries and really modern wisdom, because people are using herbs more and more these days and it's so exciting it is so exciting and gosh, of course again, so many things I can say to everything you just spoke about and let's bring it up to the excitement of so many people starting to turn to the world of herbalism.
Speaker 1:In conjunction with what you were saying in the beginning of that how you grew up with both dualities of these natural healing remedies and methods that your mom was giving you at home with these bitter taste, bitter tasting Chinese herbs and then going to the doctor to get that asthma inhaler, and how it is really beautiful and important to see those two dancing together. As a clinical herbalist, that's much of my mission, one of the things that I am observing a lot of out there today, as people are expanding their minds and returning to their roots and understanding that these plants have been here forever to heal us, are kind of just shunning everything Western medicine when you know I think they're they deserve a lot of gratitude because it can save lives. You know there is definitely a time and a place, but with this herbal medicine and with energetic medicine, we have the power to do a lot to avoid needing that.
Speaker 1:Western medical system right.
Speaker 2:Yes, I love that. I think everything has a role. I mean, when we look at nature, everything has a role, even the insects and the hummingbirds and the worms. Everything has a role. So when we can apply that same understanding to medicine, the school that I went to, luckily, was an integrative school, so we learned not only the traditional Chinese medicine understanding of medicine and biology and anatomy and physiology, but we learned also the Western understanding of what was happening with diseases and health conditions and all of the things and how to read lab tests and all those things. And when you marry the two it's like a beautiful synergy. That happens because Chinese medicine likes to say or really the Taoist understanding of Chinese medicine is you don't want to go too far off into one extreme, you actually want to have everything in moderation. So when we can balance out the Western medicine, the Western understanding, the biology, the science, with the Chinese medicine, energetics and the understanding of herbs, with these things, it creates a beautiful magic happens. Yes, exactly, exactly. That is where the magic happens.
Speaker 2:And you know, for example, the reason why I ended up going to Chinese medicine school I actually was working at a corporate job and I was not connected to what I was here to do. I was really much far away of it, far away from that as possible, and I got to a point where I actually got really sick. I had contracted a very rare amoeba and it got contracted in my eye. And, from a Chinese medicine perspective, your eyes are connected to your liver system and your liver is also connected to emotional stress. It's the first organ in Chinese medicine that contacts any sort of stress that you experience, any sort of trauma, stress, emotions that you experience. So now, retrospectively, I see that I was so stressed and I was so overwhelmed and so unaligned to my purpose, the liver also being the energy that is used towards fulfilling vision, fulfilling your purpose, planning out your focus or your vision and your dreams. I was so disconnected from that that my body then sent me this huge red sign, red signal that was like hey, you need to slow down and take a moment to really reassess what you want to do and where you're going. And that week, I remember I actually asked my mom to come down to support me and she took me to an acupuncturist and, funny enough, I didn't get acupuncture and I watched her get acupuncture, but something in me lit up and I was like I can do exactly what that person's doing. That's what I'm supposed to do. And I kid you not. Two weeks after that, I applied to Chinese medicine school. I got in and fast forward.
Speaker 2:Here I am and I understand now that when you are disconnected from your body, when you're disconnected from your purpose, when you're connected, disconnected to the medicine that your body is trying to share with you through whether it's symptoms or your hormonal imbalance or, um any sort of condition that we, we, we find there's always a purpose to that and it's telling us something and it's telling us to look deeper. And that's a lot of the principles that I I share with my clients is they bring me, um something that's happening in their life. They bring me something that's happening in their body. I'm like, well, what's happening deeper, what's happening in your environment, what's happening in your relationships, and how can we build better relationships with nature, with herbs or with our energetics of our own body to help guide us and support us in repairing um our energetics and those relationships? So there's a lot I can say on that, but yeah it.
Speaker 1:It's incredibly beautiful and deep and that's what it's all about. It's that whole body and mind and soul healing Like what is happening in a relationship. How's your work life? How's that impacting your stress levels? And when you spoke about your story and you shared that the liver is connected with emotional stress, it's connected with your vision and maybe if that there's blockage there, you're not being able to live that true vision. And prior to actually recording on this episode, we talked a bit briefly about you and your skin healing journey, and when I think of the liver, I definitely think of our skin and how you know when our skin is not happy. We know we're going to go to the liver for that in Western herbalism, and so I'd love to hear a little bit about how that's tied together for you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I love, love that. Thank you so much for bringing that up. Yeah, it was. I feel like our bodies, our health journeys, our initiations back to ourself. They're like call inner calls back to ourself and I truly feel like healing my hormones. Healing my hormonal acne was definitely a huge teacher for me on my path.
Speaker 2:And they say in Chinese medicine school that when you, as a practitioner, you get ill or you get sick or you're experiencing something, that is the best teacher of medicine, because you start to understand, hey, this is what it feels like to have a common cold or have a fever or, you know, have an upset stomach or um, go through these things that you're helping your clients and your patients with. So you know I had struggled with actually let's rewind back to when I was a teenager, I think later teenage age, like maybe 18, 19, I started taking birth control and you know it was actually something that was just offered to me in Western medicine. You know I got checked up and they're like are you interested in birth control? I said yes and then somewhere down the line I think I had taken that, not only because to help regulate my my, to help with. You know, birth control, obviously what it does contraception, but also with my hormonal acne, and I had done so many Western things. I was like going to the dermatologist and I got into the point where they told me well, you're going to, we're at this point where you can take Accutane or you can continue what you're doing, and I'm not going to talk much about Accutane, but it's a very, very strong medication for helping to clear acne and it works very deep levels of the body. But I eventually just was like this is not what I'm called to do and fast forward.
Speaker 2:I still struggled with my acne even to my adult years and then, when I was in Chinese medicine school, I was like I want to know more about what my body is doing, cause every time I have my cycle, when I'm on my period, I get acne and I get, you know, pms and I have cramps and I have all these things Like my body is telling me something that I need to understand, and I started to understand the connection between emotional stress, my liver, toxins that get built up in the liver that need to be detoxed. I started learning about the elimination pathways of your body, so your body when it is detoxing, whether it's chemicals or any sort of toxins in our body. I also want to add to that emotional, mental toxins as well, because the thoughts that we're having, the things that we're taking in from our environment, are also toxins and we need to clear those out of our bodies, and so our liver is very much responsible for that. But where I really started lighting up like this started lighting up so many things for me was when I learned that my skin was very much connected to my lungs in Chinese medicine, and you know, the lungs also are connected to our emotions. So the lung and the liver actually has a very, very strong energetic connection within Chinese medicine and they help to sort of moderate each other.
Speaker 2:But when I was going to Chinese medicine school, I started seeing acupuncturists. I started going to like the some of the best herbalists in San Diego at the time, and my herbalist would tell me well, here's what you have to do. You have to shift your eating habits. Right, I have to really start with food, because food is our medicine At the end of the day. The food that we eat, you know, three times a day, two times a day, these meals that we have, it's, it's inherently our food, or herbs, before you know any other things that we do. It's our food.
Speaker 2:So I had to change the food that I was eating. I had to focus on my detoxing or elimination pathways. So how, how often am I eliminating? How much am I sweating? Because our skin is the largest organ that we have and we detox so much through our skin and also through our breath. We actually detox 70% of our toxins in our body through our breath alone and everything else is through our elimination pathways. And so I started focusing on that. I started juicing, drinking celery juices, drinking. I started taking these really big herbal formulas, chinese medicine formulas. I think I had taken one of the top five worst tasting herbal formulas in Chinese medicine formulas. I think I had taken the top one of the top five worst tasting herbal formulas in the Materia Medica for like six months and that was helping to clear away all the heat.
Speaker 2:Because when we experience acne, in particular hormonal acne, we have something called heat that's built up in our body and dampness that's built up. We have something called heat that's built up in our body and dampness that's built up, and it's built up in our deep, in the different acupuncture channels of our body. So the herbalist I was working on prescribed me this herbal formula that helped to clear some of this dampness, clear some of this heat, move more energy, and it helped to reestablish some of the connections that my body needed to to make, cause it was like I was so energetically blocked in some of my organ systems that it wasn't able to make those connections. The communication was just not happening enough to for me to to to clear out toxins fast enough. So eventually, with that, including acupuncture, I had probably healed about 90% of my acne.
Speaker 2:But I still wasn't, still wasn't fully healed. I would still get, you know, some breakouts and I would still have some like menstrual issues and PMS and things like that and PMS and things like that. And it wasn't until I actually let go of and gave my body a break from all the medicine, all the healing. And I gave my body a break and I decided I'm going to go this time I was going to go travel. So I went to go travel on my own and I looked in the mirror and I kid you, not like this is something I would have never thought would shift my body or heal my body. But this is how I learned how important your mind, body, spirit connection is.
Speaker 2:I looked at myself in the mirror and I looked at my skin. I had a few breakouts. I looked at my eyes and it's very vulnerable when you're doing mirror work. I looked at my eyes and it's very vulnerable when you're doing mirror work and I just said to myself I love you, no matter what, no matter what you look like, no matter what you go through whatever, no matter what, really just like that deep, motherly, unconditional love for myself. And I kid you not Mel. A month later, my skin healed and I never had breakouts since.
Speaker 2:So it was like a combination of doing the physical work, changing my diet, taking the herbs, doing the exercise and then shifting and healing the emotions, like detoxing all of that from my body and then creating new neural pathways of like.
Speaker 2:No, this is how I decide to live my life and love myself and show up for myself. And I think many ways that comes from the spirit. When we can love something so unconditionally, when we can accept something with so much love, that comes directly from our spirit. And I that was the first time. I was like, wow, I understand, I understand, um, holistic healing on such a deeper level, now more than ever. So, yeah, I know that was a long story, but it seriously was a big part of my journey of like healing my skin. And so, when I teach clients, I'm like we have to look at every single level physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually like looking at every single level and auditing and clearing out and shifting and rewriting our behaviors. You know, and that's what really allowed me to show up as I do with clear, radiant skin and, yeah, I'm just so, so grateful for, for, for all those things that I learned.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love that so much and, as you were speaking, to the power of the emotions and the mind there and how we can shift those neural pathways, I was absolutely getting chills through all the parts of my body because it is. It is so true Like some people can keep doing the work, like the take the pills, if that's how they're going to take their herbs or take this and do that. But until we can shift the mind and the way that it's processing things and we're not talking the conscious mind, because we can all say consciously to ourselves all the right things, but until we believe that subconsciously and make it truth and make it real, there's still going to be that energetic blockage from true complete healing, true complete healing. And you also brought up, you know, going to the best herbalist in San Diego and how they were first telling you well, you've got to shift what you're eating, shift your diet.
Speaker 1:I feel I don't know if you get this a lot, maybe you don't, but usually when people want to come to me initially it's what herbs do I take to fix this problem? And they never want to hear about the diet and the lifestyle pieces which are absolutely essential for the herbs to really do their healing work right. Yes, without that, the herbs are like I like to use the analogy of a bonfire and inflammation and thinking about like the root inside of inflammation is flame and that's a raging bonfire, with your body telling you all of these different things if we're willing to listen and if we don't make those lifestyle shifts and we throw herbs on top of it, it's like those herbs are a little squirt gun trying to put out the bonfire. But if we make those other shifts, those herbs can then become the fire hose putting out that bonfire.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, yeah, no. So true, I think I really needed to do the inner work on and the external work, like both. You know, I couldn't just rely only on the Chinese herbs to fully handle what I was experiencing, because it was. It was on many deep levels. It was the physical level, of course, but it was also how I felt about myself and also the energy that my organs were holding, because each organ system in Chinese medicine is connected to an emotion. The lungs are most connected to sadness, grief, sorrow, but it's also connected to our ability to connect to spirit and clarity and, in many ways, happiness, and so I had to face the sadness that I was feeling, right, and also with the liver system, I had to sit with the anger, because liver is most connected to anger and irritability, and so I had to sit with frustration that I had around my body, around my skin and things that didn't work out, and you know it was. It was really like a full level, like healing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh no, we're frozen. For a moment I wonder if it's me, but you're frozen in a good spot. So if you can see me, it's not one of those frozen moments where you look really funny. Hopefully we didn't lose connection. I'm going to wait a minute.
Speaker 2:I've experienced um hold on one second, lynn.
Speaker 1:Um, we froze for a moment and it was right at this moment that you were talking about connection and you had this beautiful pose on my screen. But if you wouldn't mind rewinding like a minute or so, yeah, of course that'd be great, of course, yeah.
Speaker 2:And so, with this energetic connection between our emotions and our organ systems, if we're experiencing, let's just say, irritability or worry, that is telling us something that our organ systems, which organ systems to work with, so the liver is connected with anger and frustration. It's also connected to our vision, our purpose, what we're here to do, what we're here to give Our spleen is very much connected to worry and overthinking. It's also connected to our calm, roundedness, and our kidneys are connected to our fear and shock, but it's also connected to our spirit and our willpower and, of course, the heart is connected to our joy and it's also connected to our indifference when we're not connected to something. And so, using something like your emotions as indicators of, okay, this is maybe where I need to go with healing this part of my um, my body, right now, because I'm being led by my experience of worry and that can lead you back to well, what is my digestive system doing? What is my spleen and my stomach telling me? How do I need to shift my relationship with my gut health? And, you know, eating more probiotics, because you know, if we bridge this with science, they're seeing nowadays that our gut health is so connected to our mental health and what we experience on a daily basis and how we show up.
Speaker 2:So Chinese medicine really gives us that deeper understanding of what's happening of our body and it's sort of like a journey that it takes us on. And that's really what I went through was like I had to have all these pieces of okay, I'm doing the physical things, you know, shifting my nutrition but what emotions are there? Okay, I'm feeling a lot of sadness and frustration. Okay, can I sit with that? Can I unravel that? Can I create a safe space for that to to be here with me? Um, and to allow that energy to move because Chinese medicine again.
Speaker 2:And to allow that energy to move because Chinese medicine, again, its purpose is to move energy, to restore the flow of energy and oftentimes, when we have imbalance or health conditions, that's indicating that energy is stuck or energy is not flowing properly.
Speaker 2:So all these things that our body is showing us is essentially calling us back to ourselves and I truly think that our body has everything it needs to heal. And when we feel called to herbs, like um. So, for example, when we feel called to certain herbs, I have an herb here that's with me. It's called star anise. I've been looking at it this entire time and it wants to come here, but I put this into a soup that I made yesterday and something about that herb can help support me on what I'm already being called to, and so many of these herbs can be allies. Many of the energetic tools that we learn can be allies, just like our emotions can be allies, just like our many other things, our relationships, our environment can be allies to our own healing. It's just about developing that deep listening towards. Can I be with this and can I listen so deeply to know what I need next?
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I think that's such an important thing to bring up. It's like that listening, that listening to our body, that listening to our mind, that listening to the plants. And it unfortunately brings me up to just a comment. I got on social media the other day where I was sharing something about energetics and when to take things and and and knowing when illness, when a cold or the flu is coming by, and somebody had posted on there well, that's preposterous, who knows when they're getting ill. And I'm like well, have you had that little tickle in your throat or just that feeling of lower energy? And often she's like that's my issue. It sounded very angry and she was like that's my exact point, nobody knows that stuff. And I'm like but we do, and if we really do, and it just takes that, that listening and that just being in tune with your body and your mind, and so just hearing you speak about that brought up that little little moment in the world of social media where it's like this poor soul, yeah.
Speaker 2:And I give compassion for people who, who, who experienced that, because with so much has that has happened since for centuries, to to the wisdom of our bodies, to the knowledge that has been hidden for thousands of years, that is now coming out, is now being celebrated and honored. For so long, I think people have many people have experienced that their bodies are not safe and so we can't feel into the body or, you know, just because my body's feeling this tickle like I don't have to listen to it. You know we're told this story that, oh, our bodies just ignore the body, but our bodies are actually so innately intelligent ignore the body, but our bodies are actually so innately intelligent we were born with so much wisdom and intelligence that's integrated in our bodies. So can we listen to that? And even if that is, you know, you're kind of like, well, what does that doesn't make? You know, I don't really get it If you are somebody that connects to nature very deeply. We are just a spectrum of nature, we're just a part of nature and nature has everything it needs to heal. Like if you look at an ecosystem, it's always flowing with each other and creating these beautiful relationships and reciprocity, and so our body also has that built within itself.
Speaker 2:We just have to listen to those little tickles, to that little ping where there's an ache or maybe you're feeling like, oh yeah, I just feel a little off today. Listen to that, because your body is telling you something that you need to know. And I think, to go back to when I contracted that rare amoeba, it's because I wasn't listening to my body, it's because I was ignoring it. And I say that do the deep listening now and the reflection now, before your body really tells you you have to sit and you have to rest and you have to listen, because our bodies are are want to regenerate, they want to rejuvenate, they want you to be in your most optimal, most authentic self. And so how can we support our bodies in that process? How can we support our bodies in blooming into our most true, authentic selves? I think that's where my purpose is, and I'm sure yours is too. Mel is just helping mamas and families and people just show up and care for themselves so we can show up as our best selves.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely so much deep wisdom in this episode for anybody that is listening and it's. These are conversations that are lifelong conversations. These are practices that are lifelong practices.
Speaker 1:Today and spoke about yourself and being a woman of many hats I can absolutely hear that because when you're working with your clients, I can only imagine how much emotional work goes into what you're doing with them. And sure you're an acupuncturist and you can help clear energy in that way, and sure you know all of these amazing Chinese herbs. But really it's teaching somebody about this whole perspective of what we just covered in such a tiny little nutshell of a conversation here today. Yes, have so much to offer people in the realm of healing and learning how to heal themselves, and you know working with you one-on-one and you have a podcast also and I just I could talk to you about all of these things forever and ever and ever. But I also want you to share with everybody that's listening today how they can connect with you more, how they can learn with you more, how they can. Such a pleasure to be able to share.
Speaker 2:I mean, like you, mel you're a teacher, you're an educator you're passionate about that and that's where we have so many similarities.
Speaker 2:It's like we're here to share the knowledge. We're here to share the healing and the wisdom, and that's what I'm also so lit up by, more than ever these days, and so to find more from me, you can go to my website at wwwdrlinlovecom and there's my courses there. I have a Chinese medicine basics course where I take you into the history of Chinese medicine, the origin story of it, the different tools that we use in Chinese medicine. I actually walk you through some acupressure points, some herbalism basics in that as well, and I'm also going to be releasing out more courses on Chinese medicine. I'm really, really passionate about like empowering people with with healing themselves, because it's not about having people come back to you. I mean, they say that the best doctor is somebody that doesn't want you to come back. It's you being, yeah, it's you being able to take this wisdom and educate yourself and your family and empower yourself.
Speaker 2:So I have so many courses on my um, on my website. I have my offerings on there to work one-on-one with me and, of course, I am a medicine woman with many hats. I go anywhere from emotional releasing, somatic sessions to tending your wellness through nutrition and herbs and foods, and to like past life regressions. You know I'm seriously interested and so passionate about healing in all spectrums. So, yes, and I also have free resources to two eBooks of mine living womb wisdom from Chinese medicine and a Chinese medicine mental wellness ebook, and I also release the monthly mystic newsletter where I dive into herbs, astrology, chinese medicine, energetics, all of the things, um, and those are all free resources that are available as well. So please tune in with me if you have any questions. Seriously, I'm here to. I'm here to to share.
Speaker 1:I love all of that so much. I'm like you are my people.
Speaker 2:Finally we've connected on this show.
Speaker 1:It's so, so, so good. Just to clarify anybody listening, of course I'm going to link to everything in the show notes, but Dr Lynn Love is spelled L-I-N-H-L-O-V-E, so for those of you that wanted to know that. Um, yeah, this has been such a fabulous conversation and I'm so grateful that we've connected.
Speaker 1:I cannot wait to learn more from you. I cannot wait to have you as a guest teacher in our upcoming community herbalist program. I think you will be wonderful for that and I absolutely want to dive into the basics on Chinese herbalism and Chinese medicine. I know pieces because it came within my training, but I'm really excited. Lynn Love everywhere.
Speaker 2:So yes, thank you so much, Mel. It's been such a pleasure to be here.
Speaker 1:Thank you, lynn. Have a fabulous day. Thank you so much for tuning into another episode of the Herbalist Path. Being on this journey with you is absolutely incredible. If you dig this episode, please leave me a review on your favorite podcast player and share it with your friends so that together, we can make herbalism hashtag spread like wildflowers spread like wildflowers. On another note, I must mention that, while I know you're getting some good info here, it's important to remember that this podcast is purely for entertainment and educational purposes and is not intended to be a substitute for medical treatment. While the information in this podcast is absolutely relevant, herbs work differently for each person and each condition. That's why I recommend you work with a qualified practitioner, whether that be another herbalist, a naturopath or your doctor. So, thank you again. I am truly honored that you're tuning into these episodes and on the path with me to make sure that there's an herbalist in every home. Again, don't forget to share this episode with your friends so that we can make herbalism Hashtag spread like wildflowers.