The Medicine Modern Science Forgot

In this episode of the Brainforest Café, Dr. Dennis McKenna sits down with **Kat Maier**, a registered herbalist and physician's assistant who has practiced for more than forty years and wrote the award-winning book Energetic Herbalism. Together they explore what modern medicine loses when it separates the body from spirit: how energetic traditions read the body as a living landscape (hot or cold, damp or dry, tense or relaxed), why context can matter as much as chemistry, and where the psychedelic renaissance fits into a much older understanding of plants as medicine for the soul. It is a warm, rigorous conversation about healing, reciprocity, and our estrangement from nature. In this conversation: - Why Kat calls herself a "recovering scientist," and why she refuses to choose between biomedicine and the sacred - What energetic herbalism actually means, and how to read your own internal landscape - Why Echinacea "failed" a famous clinical trial, and how it was being used wrong - The drop of Black Cohosh that felt like a DMT journey, and what it reveals about context and healing - Drop doses, regional herbalism, and healing at the pace of tissue, not the pace of a pill - The Herbal Mutual Aid Directory, bringing plant medicine to communities after floods, fires, and storms \- - - **Kat Maier**, RH (AHG).PA has been a practicing herbalist for over forty years. She is the founder and director of Sacred Plant Traditions, LLC in Charlottesville, VA. She served as President of the Board of United Plant Savers and received their first Medicinal Plant Conservation Award. As a clinical herbalist she has taught at medical schools, Naturopathic symposiums and internationally at herbal conferences. As a former Peace Corps volunteer in Chile, coupled with her training as a Physician’s Assistant, she weaves the language of biomedicine with traditional energetic systems and wisdom. Kat served on the Admissions Committee for American Herbalist Guild (AHG) for professional membership for over ten years She is the founder of Botanica Mobile Clinic, which offers support to mental health and at-risk community members at no cost. Kat is the co-author of Bush Medicine of San Salvador Island, Bahamas, and the author of Energetic Herbalism: A Guide to Sacred Plant Traditions, Integrating Elements of Vitalism, Ayurveda, and Chinese Medicine. This book won the 2022 Gold Medal Nautilus Award. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices