If you’re not a fan of going to the doctor often (and let’s face it, who is?) you may want to start learning more about alternative medicine. More and more people are turning to alternative medicine to cure minor ailments like the common cold-or serious illnesses like cancer. If you don’t want to take prescription medication each time you have a health problem, it may be a good idea to learn more about herbal alternative-herbal medicine. These natural remedies could save you lots of money, and you may even learn how to prevent yourself from getting sick in the future from using these methods and products.

The most protective and health-restoring herbals are the liquid preparations called tonics, a name derived from their ability to keep the body’s systems and energies in tone. Tonics are a mainstay of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) the world’s most comprehensive system of natural healing. In TCM, herbal tonic is said to have a protective, balancing, and energizing quality that benefits one’s entire well-being and creates “radiant health”. Many of the ancient tonic formulas in TCM still enjoy great popularity today, both at home and around the world. And yet, the tonic herb with perhaps the most profound benefits for human health is little known outside of China. Its name is jiaogulan (jee-ow-goo-lahn), and it is Nature’s Greatest Treasure for health and longevity.

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Drinking coffee for health and weight loss is probably the most popular and controversial drugs in the world. Some so called experts claim that caffeine increases your metabolic rate, making weight loss easier and faster. Caffeine also promotes gains in short-term, high-intensity athletic performance. Caffeine decreases your perception of pain during exercise. This might explain why fitness competitors routinely down a cup of java right before exercise! Caffeine also improves mental alertness and reduces your perception of fatigue.

The coffee research, however, found that consumption of ground caffeinated coffee appeared to have an independent relationship with weight loss. The findings implied that the caffeine present in coffee may help people to decrease body weight. But no studies show any indication that weight loss from large amounts of caffeine is permanent or significant. There is also no documented evidence that increasing caffeine intake by itself can have any effect on weight loss. In addition, some studies found that decaffeinated coffee may contribute to modest changes in weight. Does coffee help weight loss? (more…)

Olive Oil has been a staple of diets along the Mediterranean coast since the dawn of recorded civilization, and while it’s tasty, it’s also been used for a number of home remedies over the years. In the event that you want to use olive oil for something a bit more medicinal than roasting garlic and chicken, please do read on.

It has been used as a skin cleaning agent and moisturizer since the days of the Persians, and possibly even longer than that. It is rich in fatty acids that can open up the pores and lift out dead skin cells, and it’s very good at moisturizing the skin. You should heat it up to about ’sipping temperature’ and rub it into your skin. You can mix it with vinegar or sugar (both work) to make it an exfoliant and skin softener.

It is a traditional remedy for softening and treating calluses and ingrown toenails. When used on the nails it keeps them grow stronger, and can clear up minor amounts of nail fungus on toenails. It can also soften the cuticles. Similarly to being used for nail care and skin care, olive oil is a traditional treatment for hair, where it acts as a conditioner and shines the hair up nicely. In all of these cases, heating the oil to ‘just barely uncomfortable’ before applying it is the recommended technique.

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We hear a lot about “Alternative Health” and “Alternative Medicine” from many sources. These “Alternative” disciplines are becoming more and more sought after, by more people then ever before. Usually it is because current mainstream medicine and practices have failed to help them, written them off as terminal or are just plain out of reach because of the astronomical costs involved. But, for many who may not have been exposed to some of these additional avenues available, the question is asked, “What are these “alternative” disciplines and why are they called “alternative”?

Here in the West, we have a medical system that is based in a culture of created, designer drugs being used to override the body’s natural processes and then using surgery when that doesn’t work. It is a system that is completely controlled by the American Medical Association (the AMA) and Pharmaceutical companies. It is a system that treats symptoms with these created drugs to ease pain or cover apparent symptoms, rather than going for the cause of the illness, and working to cure the patient.

(Because the physical symptoms are usually just a reflection of the real problem, which is frequently emotional or energy based, and not part of the actual physical body at all, the purely physical approach can’t reach it.) This approach has done a lot of good for many, killed many others and created many hardships, through dangerous and sometimes lethal side effects, for many, many others.

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