The Practice of Traditional Western Herbalism: Basic Doctrine, Energetics, and Classification Kindle Edition

If you’re new to learning herbs and serious about it, start here. The section on energetics is absolutely foundational to everything else you will ever learn.If you’ve been using herbs with the “take this herb for that ailment” mindset, you’re still using an allopathic model, you’re not working holistically, and you’re doing yourself (and the herbs!) a disservice. Learning the energetics of plants is fundamental in learning to use them well.And for those who don’t know what I mean by “energetics”, it’s not *energy* in the new agey, light worker, vibrational, crystal healing, woowoo, or any of that sort of way (unless you want it to be, haha).

If you need a remedy to help you fall asleep, this book and a little chamomile tea will work every time. All kidding aside, it is concise, easy to understand, and full of information. Exciting? Maybe only for the geekiest of herbalists, lol. An informative reference? Absolutely. My main complaint is that the information is not presented with enough illustrations for the visual learner, you will have to come up with your own diagrams in your notes if you are serious about retaining the information.

This is the single most useful book on Western Herbalism I've ever seen, the key that lets you figure out how a condition will interact with a plant. Without this system of energetics, choosing a remedy is reduced to picking one of many plants that may or may not help a condition, among long lists of properties. It gives us a vocabulary to treat the whole person, rather than just battling their symptoms as allopathic medicine does. When you battle symptoms, you ignore the body they're in and often weaken it. You may win the battle but lose the war. This is the overall strategy for restoring harmony, and goes beyond the three categories of building, eliminating and maintaining -- which are about as much theory as other authors go into.Imagine having to consult a book just to add 2 + 4, and not even being able to recognize that 4 + 2 gives the same result. Knowing this system is akin to learning simple addition: whereas everyone else is stuck memorizing addition tables or looking them up each time, you just know the answer. You don't have to memorize tons of information for a plant, just the keys to its energetic action.

A great read, a must read for herbalists. I read this as part of a Tissue States class from a local herbalist, Kathy Eich. Her book is also excellent, but geared for the beginning herbalist. This is an advanced book, but really anyone can read and understand the concepts and put them into practice.

great description of tissue states and the herbs included. you can trust Matthew Wood to pull together and synthesize a vast range of information, making it fun, memorable and interesting.If you have any of his other books, you will want this one for sure.If you are new to herbalism, it's a fascinating read that may be partially over your head at first, but understandable enough to be instantly useful, and it will grow with you as you learn.If you are somewhat experienced, it's great, and if you are super duper experienced you'd probably still like it, because M.W. is pretty fantastic.

A great overview of the energy of Western herbology. Also really like Earthwise, both the new and the old wold. All of these books are well written, can't stop reading.

this book is excellent. what i am the most pleased about in the history/research Matthew Woods provides. the integration of TCM and healing energetics is extremely helpful

I'm sure someday I might read this book but honestly it's more than I want to know at this point. Start out with basic information about the plants that live around you go from there.

Great book! Useful for every herbalist and herbal medicine student; presents in a comparative perspective western energetics, 6 tissue states, constitution assessment, primal therapeutic laws, etc.

For any herbalist, interesting to learn about the roots of the practice. Especially, because some of this knowledge is still commonly used. Well written and well researched, this book will give your more dept, both, in your practice of herbalism, and in your general development.

Lots of useful information great read and really beneficial to my studies . Would recommend to students and practitioners epic

A very interesting book, one of the most insightful herbal practitioners of today

Excellent book!