Category: Reiki

La’au Lapa’au | A Day In the Garden – Urban Moonshine

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GO INTO THE GARDEN EVERY DAY, NO MATTER WHAT.

That’s the promise I made at the start of the season. It will be a daily ritual, a practice to keep me in tune with the growth and health of the garden, and a sure way not to miss a bit of garden gossip. Like a bustling city full of honking horns, buses whizzing by, and street conversations half-heard, there is endless activity to observe. Cucumber beetles rapidly working to destroy the cucumber crop. Birds ravishing the cherry tree singing loudly to their friends to join in on the feast. Earthworms patiently turning the soil underfoot. Never a dull moment, but you need to go to the garden every day to keep up.

That has been my biggest lesson gardening this year. If you’re not there to enjoy the first ripe strawberries, the squirrels will be happy to take on that…

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La’au Lapa’au | DIY RECIPE OF THE MONTH: ORGANIC BUG REPELLENT

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It’s that time of year for patio-chillin’, outdoor grillin’, and camping adventures. When you are looking for something that isn’t laden with chemicals that will keep the pesky insects away, try this DIY Bug Repellent.

I sometimes change up the essential oils I use, but following the lead of many other home-made bug spray recipes, find this blend to be the best in practice (and smells fantastic!). The oil you don’t want to skip is the Citronella because of its power to keep the buzzing at bay.

As with all Essential Oils (EO), test on sensitive skin first to make sure you don’t have any adverse reactions and avoid eyes.

(Added bonus, I sometimes steep rosemary and lavender in my water and witch hazel mix, store in the fridge for a few days before adding to the blend for added oomph!)

THIS MONTHS RECIPE: BUG REPELLENT

WHAT YOU’LL NEED

  • 20…

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Energy Update | July 12, 2020

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Take back what is yours. You have a choice to decide what you give your mental and emotional energy to. You decide to tune in and allow it to live within you when you can just be an observer of the situations that test your patience. You might be working on yourself and evolving past the dramas that once pulled you in. There’s certain situations that return to test your evolution, but it’s not about anyone else. It’s about how much you have worked on yourself and how much it no longer affects you. When we’re learning to master our inner self we can see clearly what triggers us and those situations are the ones that require us to grow. So be thankful when things come up because you now know how to work through it instead of overreacting and overthinking it. Mastering yourself is an everyday experience that helps you get better at being the best you. You’ll realize you no longer have the energy to play along or react so easily. You find yourself investing your time in what adds value into your life. Your focus becomes about living a more enriched life because anything else is draining your precious life force. Ask yourself is it even worth giving my precious life force to something that happened in the past? To someone who doesn’t deserve it? To a situation you outgrew? Remember, your attention and your focus is your power. The scenarios you overthink and constantly replay aren’t evolving you. Stop the self-judgment and just forgive yourself. Decide now that you’re going to better manage your energy. You’re going to think, feel, and do what evolves you. You’re going to make peace with what has happened and what you can’t change. Starting today you’re going to take your power back by consciously deciding what you feed your energy. Don’t allow anyone to thrive off of you feeling low or down about yourself. You have the power to manage your mental and inner world which will reflect how you handle everyday life. Be very patient with yourself. You’re evolving and learning. Things will get more clear for you.

La’au Lapa’au | Adulteration of English Lavender (Lavandula angustifolia) Essential Oil

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Citation (JAMA style): Bejar E. Adulteration of English Lavender (Lavandula angustifolia) essential oil. Botanical Adulterants Prevention Bulletin. Austin, TX: ABC-AHP-NCNPR Botanical Adulterants Prevention Program; 2020.

The main goal of this bulletin is to provide timely information and/or updates on issues of adulteration and mislabeling of essential oil (EO) of English lavender (Lavandula angustifolia Mill) in particular with lavandin (Lavandula × intermedia Emeric ex Loisel, syn. Lavandula angustifolia Mill. × Lavandula latifolia Medik.), spike lavender (Lavandula latifolia Medik.), linalool and linalyl acetate- rich EOs, terpenes, and synthetic chemicals.

This bulletin may serve as a guide for quality control personnel, the international herbal products, cosmetic, and essential oil industries, and the extended natural products community in general. It is also intended to present a summary of the scientific data and methods on the occurrence of species substitution, adulteration, the market situation, and economic and…

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La’au Lapa’au | Crafting Herbal Extracts…. – My Herbal Adventures…

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I shared Anne’s email with you and a bit of her website for she is my herbalist, my go-to for tinctures, extracts, balms, etc. I have complete trust in her expertise, the products she endeavors to create, her passion, and drive. I am honored and pleased to introduce you to Anne, my herbalist, and friend.

By the way, here is the link to Anne’s shop…

https://www.etsy.com/shop/AnnesBackyardHerbal

by aspiringherbalist

I have now been crafting herbal extracts, mainly; Tinctures, Glycerites, Vinegars & Skincare Oil infusions, for 4 years now. Even though I am no expert and consider myself a novice, I have learned a new lesson every year. As I learn and read and discover new ways of determining how to best create a plant extract that is both effective & well-rounded, I also have to consider its flavor, consistency and taste. I have experimented with different combinations of solvents over the…

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Meditation …

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Your body channels messages to you everyday, telling you what it needs and what your mind, heart and soul needs.

If you need to let go of something, it will tell you through pain or any other disharmony. If you need to eat better foods, sleep more or drink more water it will give you clear signs.

If you are holding on to the past, it will let you know. It will signal to you the same thing over and over if you don’t face the root of the discomfort or dis-ease that you are experiencing.

I used to be able to shut down all the signals that my body gave me, overriding them with the will of my mind and thoughts, overlooking the importance of what my body was trying to tell me. To deny your body what it deserves and to deny it the very best of life, is to punish the vessel that is your greatest resource and gift that you have been blessed with in order to live this life fully.

Love yourself enough to listen to your body, to love it and to be One with it.

Energy Update | July 7, 2020

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If you knew right now 100% that everything is being aligned, connected, and drawn to you, would you even be worried or even for a second overthinking it? No, you would just trust, believe, and be in an expecting state. You would know that the order you put in with the universe or what you intended is already yours. You would feel like it’s complete. You would be smiling. This is a powerful state to be in. An expectancy state. A trusting state. A state of real strong faith that it’s is already done. Look at your vision as a something being packaged and made its way to you. All the pieces you ordered is all being together. We must start transcending from feeling smallness to owning greatness. You must be assertive with your vision. You must claim it. You manifest because you have already convinced yourself that you deserve greatness. This sense that you are worthy makes it even more fun because it’s an energy state that “you have finally claimed what’s rightfully yours!” So be more confident today knowing that within you, you have eased up, relaxed, and trusted that your wildest dreams is currently being packaged and making its way to you. This will shift how you feel through out the day. This will ignite a familiar power within you that lets you know everything is okay, that you can keep going forward confidently. It’s all about how you trust. It’s all about owning the completion, arrival, and success of your vision now. You are greatness right now. You are successful right now. You are a blessing and a miracle right now. You are complete right now. You are loved and loving right now. It’s already done!

Reiki | 432 Hz | Positive Energy | Miracle Healing Frequency | Manifest Love, Harmony & Raise Positive Vibes

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432 Hz music to raise positive vibrations and clear energy for healing and manifestation of harmony & love. Frequency healing music has the potential to cleanse your energy and raise your vibration. Everything is energy/frequency. So When we listen to 432 Hz music, ambient, meditative, healing or regular music, it can put us into a state of harmonic resonance where the body and mind is aligned with a higher frequency, thus then we can attract from that state of frequency and manifest the things we really want in life. Use this for positive energy and/or clearing out old negative energy.

Alchemy | Banana Brandy – Making Ugandan Waragi (Moonshine)

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We prepare Ugandan Waragi (War Gin) a distilled spirit of banana wine.

For more info on the distillation process check out our other new video https://youtu.be/RKzL2tM3qBc

Note that in some states it is illegal to distill ethanol unless you obtain a permit.

VICE video link: https://youtu.be/zL3UHF5SlEU

Correction: I made a mistake in the conversion of teaspoons/tablespoons into milliliters. Please use the tsp/tbsp guidelines of the addition of the amylase and the yeast.

It’s A Lavender Season! Lavender Association of Colorado

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The cultivar of the Month

Lavender coloradoJune 2020 Cultivar of the Month
Lavandula angustifolia ‘Hidcote Pink’

Hidcote Pink is another versatile lavender grown in Colorado.  It is an excellent culinary variety.  It produces an exceptionally sweet oil that several growers use in conjunction with other lavender essential oils to make unique blends.  Planted with purple lavenders, the pink flowers make the purple flowers “pop” in the landscape.
Hidcote Pink is not really good for crafting as in drying it loses its pink color and dries to a brown.
Hidcote Pink plants are 30-40″ tall.  Stems are in the 6-10″ range.  Spacing the plants 36″ apart should allow them to remain separate over the years.
Hidcote Pink was developed by Major Lawrence Johnston in Gloucester, England, and became available around 1958.  It is hardy in zones 5-9.  It blooms once in the spring.

lavender dilution

Dilution The Key To Using Essential Oils Safely

We…

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Botanical Brews – An introductory guide to using tropical specialty ingredients in beer

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By Amanda Dix

(Blogmasters’ note: Experiencing craft beer is a high point for many connoisseurs these days. While beer in its various forms has been around for millennia, today’s brew-masters have taken beer to a whole new level by adding unique flavor combinations to their recipes. Capitalizing on that trend, many gardens and arboreta are incorporating special tasting events into their program repertoire that highlight the herbs that make each brew unique. Below are some of horticulturist and brewer Amanda Dix’s suggestions for upping your botanical beer game. Even if you don’t brew yourself, these might inspire you to try new things and understand how herbs are woven into this timeless beverage.)

Many culinary dishes and beverages are abundant with tropical herbs, spices, and fruit. Beer is no exception, and using unique ingredients alongside barley, hops, and yeast is very common these days.

When formulating a beer recipe, be sure…

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La’au Lapa’au | What Is Bulbine?

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Bulbine frutescens, B. latifolia (syn. B. natalensis), and B. narcissifolia
Family: Xanthorrhoeaceae (syn. Asphodelaceae)

INTRODUCTION

Bulbine species are geophytic (plants that have a subterranean storage organ known as a corm), aloe-like succulent perennials with rosettes of fleshy leaves. The amount of water stored above ground (succulence) in Bulbine species, however, may be more important for survival than the amount stored in the corm (geophytism).1 The Bulbine genus includes approximately 78 species2 with a highly disjunct distribution,1 occurring almost entirely in southern Africa,1,2 but with six species in Australia.3 This article concerns the most widely used African species: B. latifolia (syn. B. natalensis), known as broad-leaved bulbine,4 and as rooiwortel (“red root”) in Afrikaans due to its red-orange corm5; B. frutescens, known as stalk-bulbine,6 burn jelly plant, cat’s tail, and snake flower7; and B. narcissifolia…

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Meditation Moments

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”Every day you look into a mirror to observe your face and body, because you want to look your best before others. Is it not even more important to look daily into the inner mirror of introspection, self-analysis, to insure the proper visage of that which is behind the superficial appearance?

All outer attractiveness derives from the divinity of the indwelling soul. And as even a little scar on the face spoils its beauty, so are there psychological disfigurements of anger, fear, hatred, jealousy, worry from the uncertainties of mortal existence, which mar the reflection of the soul. If every day you strive to free yourself from these defacements, the beauty of your inner being will shine forth.

Human troubles are threefold: those that afflict the physical body, those that attack the mind, and those that occlude the soul. Disease, old age, and death are the difficulties of the body.

Psychological maladies invade through sorrow, fear, anger, unfulfilled desires, discontentment, hate, any fever of nervous excitation or mental cancer of emotional obsession.
And the soul sickness of ignorance, which is the most injurious of all, is the underlying condition that makes possible all other troubles.

Try constantly to improve yourself. Seek out good company, company that reminds you of God and of the noble things in life. Be conscious every day of how you are going to change your bad habits; how you are going to schedule your day; how you are going to hold your calmness.

Start the morning in meditation and praying deeply to God; and after you have meditated, ask God to guide your life and all your noble efforts.

Determine to be better in every way that day. If you start in the morning and keep on working at trying to hold on to your calmness, or trying to put into effect some good habit that you want to acquire, thinking of God all the time, then when night comes you can go to sleep knowing that you have put the day to good use. You will know you are making progress.”

– Paramahansa Yogananda

La’au Lapa’au | Herbal Companies Brace for Supply Chain Impacts of COVID-19

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This article reports on market conditions as of mid-April 2020 for herbal ingredients and products. Crooked Bear Creek Organic Herbs {CBCOH} is not recommending any of the mentioned botanical ingredients as remedies to prevent or treat coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19).

On March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the outbreak of the novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, a global pandemic. By the end of March, about one-third of the world’s population was under some form of quarantine or public lockdown, and the virus has prompted a tsunami of disruptions to the global economy.1

The pandemic has had ripple effects across every economic sector, as companies and workers have halted travel and adapted to the new reality of “nonessential” business closures, supply chain interruptions, and nationwide stay-at-home orders. It is an unprecedented event for most people and has the potential to forever change life and business.

For the herbal products…

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La’au Lapa’au | Food as Medicine: Moringa (Moringa oleifera, Moringaceae)

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Moringa oleifera is one of the 12 known Moringa species in the horseradish tree family (Moringaceae) that flourish in drier parts of the world.1 Nine species occur in eastern Ethiopia, northern Kenya, and Somalia, of which eight moringa flowersare endemic to Africa, and three species occur in India.1,2 Belonging to the Brassicales order, this plant family is distantly related to cruciferous vegetables like arugula (Eruca vesicaria ssp. sativa, Brassicaceae) and broccoli (Brassica oleracea var. italica, Brassicaceae) and contains many of the same nutrients and sulfurous phytochemicals.1,3 Moringa species grow as stout-stemmed trees or shrubs. Some species are known as bottle trees and have a large root system that enhances water storage and aids the trees’ survival during periods of drought.1 Members of the Moringa genus have corky gray bark and distinct bi- or tri-pinnately compound leaves that have conspicuous swellings, or pulvini, at…

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La’au Lapa’au | NAHA | Fennel: A Versatile Powerhouse of Nutrition 

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Fennel: A Versatile Powerhouse of Nutrition 
By Marie Olson, RWP, NTP, CA 

Fennel is an interesting and versatile plant. It has several uses culinarily, and also provides benefits herbally and aromatically.

Fennel (Foeniculum vulgare) is a perennial herb that is highly aromatic. It has been described as having the flavor of black licorice, or anise (Pimpinella anisum), but many find it to be much milder, which makes it suitable for a variety of applications. There are three different plant parts that are used in cooking: The seeds, the stalk/bulb, and the fronds.

Edible Parts of Fennel

The fronds resemble dill (Anethum graveolens) in both appearance and flavor. That makes sense, since both fennel and dill are from the Apiaceae family, which includes celery (Apium graveolens), parsley (Petroselinum sativum), and coriander (Coriandrum sativum). It is also a relative of anise (Pimpinella anisum), which it resembles both physically and aromatically. The fronds are often used as a garnish…

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La’au Lapa’au | NAHA | Herbal Salves for Aromatherapy

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Herbal Salves for Aromatherapy

By Anna Pageau, NAHA Certified Professional Aromatherapist®

What is a salve? A salve as defined by dictionary.com is “a medicinal ointment for healing or relieving wounds and sores.”1 Many over-the-counter remedies are salves such as Neosporin®. Lip balms are also a form of salve, so a salve doesn’t have to be medicinal, just nourishing to the skin. Salves in general are a simple formula with just a few ingredients. They generally include an oil and a wax to create a semi-solid material. Today people use the terms “lotion bars” or “balms” to also describe salves.

These oil-rich salves are used to nourish and protect skin. They lock moisture in, keeping skin soft and smooth throughout the seasons. Salves can be made as thick as a bar of soap. A salve will remain in a solid state…

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La’au Lapa’au | Boswellia Extract May Be Beneficial for Reducing Inflammation and Pain in Patients Newly Diagnosed with Knee Osteoarthritis

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Osteoarthritis (OA) is a common age-related disorder associated with chronic inflammation, joint pain, decreased mobility, and negative impact on quality of life. OA of the knee is the most common form of arthritis. Acetaminophen and nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) are the primary medications used for symptoms related to OA of the knee. These pharmacological interventions often lead to gastrointestinal, renal, and cardiovascular risk. Gum resin extracted from boswellia (Boswellia serrata, Burseraceae) has been used in Ayurvedic medicine to treat chronic inflammatory diseases, including OA. Studies have shown boswellia extract to be beneficial for treating age-related inflammatory disorders. In this randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled pilot study, Boswellin (Sabinsa Corporation; East Windsor, New Jersey) was evaluated for its efficacy and safety in treating OA of the knee and to determine the interactions of b-boswellic acid with progression of OA of the knee.

Male and female patients between the ages of 35 and…

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