Chamomile has a quite personality, and it's the quiet ones you need to watch out for.

​She's gentle but inexorable, quieting our inner whine, easing tension you didn't know you had and some you did- she's particularly helpful with the lower abdomen, and I've used Chamomile tea to great effect when I had pelvic floor area cramping twice (NOT a pain I'd wish on most people!)

Chamomile people have a frozenness to them. Emotionally this can look like petulance- I don't KNOW what I want but it's NOT THIS😤 or physically it can be really stuck muscles that don't give and won't let anyone in to help.

Chamomile also changes her ways when you give her time- a sweet, fragrant tea becomes deep and bitter, encouraging movement in the digestive system. Plants, like people, aren't just one thing.

Chamomile remedies made gently, like a short-steeped tea, preserve the aromatics and work with more surface-level complaints like muscle tension or mental blocks (particularly around transitions.)

Deeper remedies like a long-steeped tea work deeper, easing transitions in that lower abdomen. You'll need to get to know your plants to know when and how to capture their moods!

​I think many of us are regularly having “Near Living Experiences,” nearly living as fully as we can but not quite. We're ignoring these experiences in the face of our busy lives, letting them pass us by, and instead accepting Just Getting By (JGB) as good enough.
 
Near Living Experiences are the chances, opportunities, and openings for us to make the big and the small changes that would wildly improve our quality and appreciation of our lives- but the steps involved usually prove too much:

1. Look up from the crazy-busy of our life
2. Recognize the moment in front of us
3. Accept that whatever the venture is, you can both accomplish it AND benefit from it
4. Take on some amount of extra work to learn some kind of new skill
5. Practice this new skill while it’s still different and separate from your normal reality
6. Absorb this new skill into your very being’s fibers, making it automatic and ordinary SOP for you

 
The route from step 1 to Step 6 is, actually, huge. These are legitimately HARD steps.
 
It’s no wonder we can’t take advantage of our Near Living Experiences, what with all the rest of Life™ going on, and that JGB is the habitual order of things.
 
And it’s also no wonder that a LOT of people come to the realization that they MUST make some kind of change at a crisis point in their life, when JGB has stopped being a viable option.
 
At that point, you realize that any amount of work required between step 1 and step 6 is reasonable, since you simply must get to step 6 to ever feel better.
 
But this JGB habit, it’s not really a comfortable one, is it? It’s like the frog in the pot metaphor- if you put a frog in hot water, it’ll jump out. But if you put a frog in a pot of cold water then put it on low heat, the frog will sit there with its world getting gradually hotter, until it IS the soup.
 
(I have no idea if this story is true. But it illustrates the point!)

​We tend to accept small injuries, small adaptations, small shifts in our patterns as just one more thing that we’re too overwhelmed to deal with.  In the buffet of dumpster fires before us, what’s a sore ankle?
 
Over time, though, that sore ankle causes a limp, that changes your gait and your hip function. This impacts your psoas, which tightens up and tilts your pelvis, impinging circulation in your abdomen. Slow, heavy, uncomfortable periods become the norm, and digestion stagnates too, leading to bloating and pain since lymph can’t drain away. Now your energy is low, because you’re not digesting well to support it, nor are you eating well because you feel like crap and that’s a hard place to make healthy choices from.
 
While you’ve been focusing on the dumpster fires, your own building is burning.

In the Foot to Forehead Fix, we use a 3-pronged approach:

1. Turn down the flames and repair the damage, with inner herbal healing
2. Rebuild the structure, with alignment and movement practices
3. Encourage your re-learning, and taking control and ownership of your health, with multi-media support and reinforcements

 
Those that attended my Aches and Pains workshop got a free Stick Figures of Demonstration fun sheet, to help them learn and practice aligning their pelvis. (You can too, it’s inside my free Resources Hub www.paulasherbals.com/login)
 
These fun sheets are one kind of learning medium we use. There’s also the private and the group learning sessions that are held weekly. And we have a private online community, where I share the replays of our group classes and hold discussions. There’s all kinds of good stuff, really.

I invite you to take a look inside the Foot to Forehead Fix today, because this IS A NEAR LIVING EXPERIENCE. You're nearly living to the fullest extent you can- let's get you there.

Have you been suffering a lack of movement during the shutdown? Are you stiff, achey, and sore? 

I know, me too. No matter how much things have changed for you, chances are almost 100% that your regular routines have been upended and you're not moving as much or as well as you were just last month. Ugh.

Let's not beat around the bush.

• I want to teach you a simple, fundamental move that will relieve most of your aches and pains, and I want to share a common herbal remedy that will help the relief stick
• You want to feel better, move better, and even rest better

Sounds like we need to hang out!👍

What are you doing next Wednesday, May 6, at noon EST? Not much? Great, you should join me then for a FREE webinar!

What kind of webinar? Well, in classic Paula style, it will include some interesting facts, some movement practice, and a bit of plant medicine. I'm going to show you a super easy, sitting-in-a-chair position that has the potential to to remove the strains and stresses on your body from poor posture and improve everything from low back pain to reflux (if you practice). (We're also going to share a spot ☕ of tea.)

It's a tiny shift, a subtle habit to form, that can rock your world. And it can be yours, in less than an hour, on a Wednesday afternoon. Not bad, hmm?

And like I said, this is FREE. Zero dollars. Gratis. All you need to do is register HERE, and you'll get the link to the webinar, as well as the details you'll need to know beforehand, in your email. 

Oh, and why not invite a couple friends too? This'll be fun!

Have you ever felt the slow, disorienting fall? Sure, I’ve missed a step, stumbled, tumbled, crashed, and just plain dropped. But that one time, on a street corner, it was very different.
 
I had food bags in both hands, I was contemplating how I was going to reach my keys when I got to the parking lot, and I stepped into a handicap ramp on a corner.
 
It was early spring, a beautiful day, and the restaurant across the street had an outdoor deck full of diners. A winter’s worth of plowing had deposited a good layer of tiny gravel and glass shards on the ramp, and I put my foot down. It just didn’t stay there.
 
As I started to slide my mind shattered into about a dozen pieces:

• I'm falling backwards! I worried about hitting my head
• I'm sliding forwards! I worried about ending up in the busy street
• The gravel was so LOUD! It was surprising
• Will anyone from the restaurant deck see me?
• Don’t squash the food. Don’t squash the food.
• What is happening?!

What’s the point?
 
Simply, that one day you may also find yourself on unstable footing, unlike anything else you’ve ever experienced before, and in need of grounding, direction, or even adaptation.
 
Sometimes it’s something physical that changes you dramatically. Sometimes is your perception or acceptance of what's “normal” or “reality”. Whatever it is, it can shake you up and make you lose your senses.
 
And I get it. I can help.

I’m stepping into the space of working on our physical foundations, literally and figuratively. Whether you’re trying to avoid, recover from, or adjust to your own slide in the gravel, we’ll get you settled first, see what’s what, and build a framework to help you work in the strengthening and supporting practices I give you- like scaffolding.

​You're not alone.

​You can’t trip over an exercise article without mention of the “core”. But seriously, who cares? Well, it IS pretty useful, in all honesty.
 
Our bones exist for our muscles to pull on them (among other reasons, of course. Cool it, #anatomynerd) We need our muscles to pull on our bones to move, like a lever and pulley system, but also to stabilize the pulleys (joints) so we don’t fall apart.
 
The core is cool because the middle of our torso doesn’t have any bones. Instead, layers of muscles between the pelvis, ribs, and spine work to help keep us upright, to keep us from peeing ourselves, and to create “intra-abdominal pressure”- useful for things like digestion and blood pressure.
 
So the core is really the front, back, top, AND bottom muscles of the torso- abdominals, pelvic floor, diaphragm, spine muscles. They’re supposed to have some give and take, some ability to expand and contract, and not just be locked in for that impossible-to-attain washboard looking thing.
 
Besides, if the rest of your body is mis-aligned, the core can’t work the way it’s supposed to anyway. What does this look like?
 
At the bottom end of things, the core is attached to the hips and pelvis. So if your leg and hip muscles are uneven, unengaged, or unbalanced, they will pull your core off-center and impact the function of everything from your feet to your spine.
 
At the top end, rib flaring is common in our “chest out, belly in” culture. We learn how to Stand Up Straight by throwing out the chest, not by straightening our alignment- it’s fake posture. This puts an awful lot of strain on the psoas (pilates peeps, you knew I couldn’t get through any mention of anatomy without the delightful psoas making an appearance!!) and on the neck.
 
Any kind of alignment issues will literally mess you up from your feet to your forehead.
​

Rather than thinking of the core like a “wall” with a front and back, think of it like a balloon. Your abdominals wrap around your torso like plastic wrap (or a corset), your pelvic floor supports it at the bottom, and your diaphragm supports it at the top.
 
What would happen to that balloon if you squeezed it in the middle (the equivalent of sucking your belly in)?
 
First, all your organs get squeezed, and they’ve got nowhere to go. They lose all movement and blood flow is reduced. For context, a good deep breath can move your kidneys 3 inches side to side.
 
Second, all that squeezed intra-abdominal pressure has to go somewhere, and it only has 3 choices- up, down, or out.
 
If you squeeze the balloon and the top bulges, now you’ve got pressure pushing UP on the stomach, esophagus, etc. Reflux, and all its friends, are common. Plus, since blood flow is being cut off any kind of inflammation in there (think: leaky gut, ulcers, esophagus erosion) can’t be healed very well.
 
Bottom-directed pressure pushes on the pelvic floor. This can look like urge or stress incontinence (I can’t hold it vs sneeze pee), prolapse (or enlarged prostate in men), pain (during elimination, sex, sitting, walking, etc), constipation, or the like.
 
Out-pressure exits through the belly button. Hernia. ‘Nuff said.
 
Absolutely NONE of these are easy issues to deal with. Wouldn’t you rather avoid them in the first place?
 
The very first thing you can do to help is relax your belly, right now. Then, by the time you’ve finished reading this sentence, relax it again. Got you, didn’t I?
 
The idea of sucking in is so very, very ingrained. It’s good for support. It’s good for looks. It’s good for who knows what else. But it’s not. No more than tight shoes or tight bras or tight shirts and jackets are good for us, regardless of how we think they look.  

At what point does a toddler’s cute round belly become a sign of “letting yourself go”, and who taught you that anyway? It’s crap. They know how to move naturally, let's take some lessons from the under-3 set.
 
Your core muscles reflexively engage when you need them. They relax and allow for internal functioning when you don’t. Yes, you can work with someone like me to align and strengthen them when lifestyles aren’t challenging enough to do it already (that’s most of us, tbh.) You can also make sure you’re breathing when you move, that’s a massively important part of the core reflex.
 
The biggest thing you can do, though, is relax your belly.
 
Sucking in only rearranges your internal organs. It does NOT support, stabilize, brace, or improve anything. And yet, just about everyone has this habit, me included. The practice is just to relax, over and over and over, retraining yourself that relaxed is normal.
 
Yes, there’s conversations to be had about the position of the pelvis, and muscle recruitment patterns, and stress responses and habits, and other such related subjects. And yes, there’s LOTS of practitioners out there besides me who have wonderfully helpful and accurate things to teach you about this.
 
Learn from them, or from me, whichever- just learn it! Your body is supposed to work and move, fashion and culture keep it restrained and embarrassed, you have to practice to relearn natural habits. That's my calling, relearning those natural habits. Check out ways to work with me if you're interested. ​

In the midst of these uncertain times, we’re “All in the same boat, but not all in the same storm.” I wish I could remember who wrote those words, because the sentiment seems to perfectly encapsulate how differently everyone is experiencing the Covid-19 crisis. Personally I am alternating between fear and anxiety (which drives me to excessive production as a way to deflect the unknown) and acknowledging my decades of fatigue and exhaustion already brought on by excess productivity (which calls me to rest and contemplate and dream). As a result of these two states, I’m having bouts of insight that I’m moved to record here for the future shape of my work. However, I don’t want you to think that I am suggesting you should use this time to be, do, or change anything that doesn’t feel appropriate for you now. Even I can’t do that, and these are my thoughts. Just know that in the After Times, these posts will form the foundation of how I want to effect change in the world. Do what you can for yourself now. 

​You too? 
Here's 2 stretches that are part of the Release & Relief program that can help ease your tech neck. 
Read more about the R&R program or reach out if you have questions!

​​For so many years, Pilates and Herbal Medicine have been my 2 separate lives. At first I was overwhelmed with my pilates studio situation, and when that changed it was a relief but I no longer had the independence to be creative. I couldn't break down the gate between these two wellness approaches. 
 
My entire pilates career, I’ve been hearing about how surprisingly great pilates clients felt once they got into their practice. At the same time, I’ve been hearing about how amazed herbal clients were that simple plants could change their digestive system, stress responses, mental focus, ability to heal, and more.
 
Now, as I write this, it’s day 16 of my own coronavirus shut down. I’ve only seen my pilates machines maybe twice, while I was picking up some items to try and make workout-at-home videos. And I’ve been seriously contemplating the overlap of movement medicine and herbal medicine.
 
Here’s what I believe: It’s all inputs. Nothing we take in or do “makes up” for past inputs. No amount of exercise “makes up” for sitting most of the day, or eating anything, or dwelling in spite or anger. I don’t believe there’s any subtraction or division or past- there’s only addition, or multiplication, and future. This is what my experience has taught me.

Maybe it's not a good time to introduce a new program. People are stressed. We're experiencing collective anxiety, fear, and trauma. Our routines have been trashed, our freedoms curtailed, our very ability to move restricted. 

Maybe it's the perfect time to introduce a new program. Avoidance coping mechanisms mean we spend all day at the computer, or on the couch. Learning how to exercise in our living rooms and basements via Zoom and YouTube leads to unaccustomed tweaks and soreness. So many people adopting the WFH lifestyle are unprepared for the amounts of time they'll spend in a different chair, at a different desk, without the support and customs of their "normal" day in place. 

I don't know. Maybe it's both.

The very fact that we're not supposed to leave our homes means that we should be deliberately trying to move more in them. The very stress we're sinking under has a multitude of outlets in Adaptogens, herbs that help us adapt to stressful environments. The very virus we're threatened with requires us all to look after our immune systems, one of many systems that traditions like Herbalism are very well prepared to build and support.

So maybe this isn't for you. Instead, it might be perfect for someone you know. Or it is perfect for you, but there's just too much "I can't even right now" for you to focus. All that is fine. 

Here's all the details about my new online program that combines movement, herbal medicine supports, private coaching, and small-group learning. I'm calling it Release and Relief: Back and Pelvic Pain Edition

You're invited to join, share, or ignore- whatever fits you best. 

Aren’t these Grape Hyacinth cute? They’re tiny too, just a couple inches high. If you wanted to, could you get your face all the way down to the ground to find out if they’re fragrant?
                    
There’s 2 parts to that question- whether you have the mobility to get your face that close to the surface of the Earth without having fallen on it, and also whether your clothes allow for that much movement. Both can be improved upon! The first is something I can help you with. The second is something you choose.

Let’s think about the clothes for a second. I went to the Mutter Museum and looked in horror at the misshapen skeleton of a corseted woman. It’s incredible that anyone would have accepted that as not only fashion but proper and essential.

But then I thought about today’s fashion. I am not generally considered fashionable- tasteful, maybe, and sometimes even matching, but certainly not a trend-follower. And yet I own jeans I have to unbutton when I drive. I own boots that could break an ankle, or in fact one pair that could prevent an ankle break they’re so stiff. (They’re the ones that messed up my knee.) I own underwire bras, and too-small underwear, and narrow-shouldered button-down shirts.
 
Clothes that restrict movement are called body casts. That name makes sense, since they hold us back like a medical cast or splint would. And you know what- I love some of them. Those break-an-ankle boots are gorgeous. I traded an entire pilates training package for them years ago, they’re knee high stretch suede by a real designer, and heeled. Amazing. But. I rarely wear them.
 
The concern is really for when we wear our body casts day in and day out. When we train our bodies to lose mobility and support structures, or even damage circulation and lymphatic drainage. What good is, say, getting out in the garden if your pants cut off your lower body blood flow and your bra won’t let you take a deep breath? It’s not like torture, it IS torture!

What would it take to allow yourself the freedom to completely move, to have full Range of Motion, at least most of the time? Sure there are special occasions, but what would your life be like if your Usual Occasions gave you access to more movement? Movement is medicine too. 
 
If you’re not sure what you’d even do with more range, then let me introduce you to the Release and Relief online coaching program. We’re learning to release long-held buttresses that have been holding you up while the rest of you couldn’t, and to move with newly aligned muscles. There’s also herbal supports built in, because that stress and GI inflammation isn’t doing your back pain any favors, for example.
 
If you have made the transition into moveable clothing, what has it been like?