August 2008 - Featured Articles

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Dream Time Herbs
By Abrah Arneson

Bears are frequently associated with herbal medicine. They have an uncanny ability to find medicinal plants, dig up the roots and use them for their well being. Bears are also great dreamers. As the bear sleeps through the winter, having made a bed of leaves, she dreams of seasons yet to come. I wonder if the bear chooses to sleep upon leaves from plants known to enhance dreaming?

As I harvest the last of the roots the garden has to offer, I become a bit of a grumpy bear myself. My mind turns to a long winter’s dream of spring. I prepare to make myself a dream pillow.

Dream pillows, embroidered with stars and moons, have long been used to deepen sleep. Deep sleep, in turn, enhances physical healing. Many of our modern illnesses are helped with better quality sleep. The gentle scents of a dream pillow will guide you into a deep healing sleep. But this is not what my interest is today. My thoughts are on dreaming.

Mugwort (Artemsia vulgaris) is frequently found in dream pillows. A common meadow plant, Mugwort is one of the seven sacred herbs of the Druids. She belongs to a family of plants named after the Greek goddess of wild place. I frequently give Mugwort to women who have lost touch with their wild place within.

In dream pillows, Mugwort helps you find your way with dreams. It enhances dream recall for those who cannot remember their dreams. It brings the gift of lucid dreaming to those who wish this skill. And for some, it brings prophetic dreams. Some say Mugwort guides women during their moon time into a deeper understanding cyclic nature of life. Others use Mugwort to enhance daydreams and ritual journeys. Wherever you are at in your dream world, Mugwort will help you understand and learn from these gifts of the night.

Another herb frequently found in dream pillows is Lavender (Lavendula angustifolia). Some people are frightened of their dreams. Dreams to them come from dark places. They are difficult to understand and their messages are feared. Lavender in a dream pillow helps us let go of the anxiety associated with these dreams. The lovely calming scent of Lavender helps us let go of the anxieties of the day and approach our dreams with ease and a sense of well being. Lavender helps you wake refreshed.

The final herb most frequently added to dream pillows is Hops (Humulus lupus). Hops is used in herbal medicine to bring on sleep. It is a very bitter herb and difficult to drink as a tea. In a dream pillow, the scent of Hops will bring the peace of sleep to you and help you find sleep again if you wake in the middle of the night.

In Alberta, with our long winter nights, dreaming can be a deeply healing and inspiring time. Add a pillow made from the green leaves of summer and you will feel like Shakespeare when he wrote, “Oh to sleep, perchance to dream”.

Abrah Arneson is a Clinical Herbal Therapist (CHT). She practices at The Green Clinic: Herbal and Traditional Healing where she offers private consultations and workshops on the use of herbal medicine. For more information, she can be contacted at 403-352-2820 or www.abraherbalist.ca