Make Way for “Fungi Perfecti”

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I’ve been hearing for years about the company mycologist at New Chapter, Paul Stametz, who up until recently helped them put out the immune formula “Host Defense” as well as their fairly extensive line of mushroom concoctions. No longer associated with New Chapter, Paul has started his own company Fungi Perfecti and taken along with him the trademark name “Host Defense” as the title of his new line of mushroom products. Mr. Stametz probably has more to say about fungi than anyone you’ll ever meet. As I once quoted from his Growing Gourmet and Medicinal Mushrooms:

“Not only are mushrooms a protein-rich food source for humans, but the byproducts of mushroom cultivation unlocks nutrients for other members of the ecological community. The rapid return of nutrients back into the ecosystem boosts the life cycles of plants, animals, insects (bees), and soil microflora. The soil that fungi produce sustains, ultimately all life. The complex activity of mushroom allies allows habitats to achieve degrees of biological intensity that are absent in fungally impoverished habitats. It is the fungal web that holds habitats together.”

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I’m excited to be carrying some Fungi Perfecti products in our store, including “MyCommunity”, the new immune booster, which is the “Host Defense” formula made the way Paul Stametz intended.

We have quite a few customers who regularly purchase homeopathic remedies from our store, including patients of some notable local homeopaths. So, it is part of my job at Rainbow to have more than a layman’s knowledge of the intricacies of homeopathy. Some people who shop here aren’t even aware that homeopathy forms a distinct branch of natural medicine, almost entirely different from an herbal approach, either Western or Chinese. Briefly describing the medicine to these people often invokes a blank stare of either disbelief or confusion, or both.

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Homeopathy, in a simplistic explanation, is based on the idea that a substance that either directly or energetically stands behind a series of symptoms as a cause, can also be the cure for that set of symptoms. Apis mellifica, for example, is quite literally made from bees and, in most cases, would be the most appropriate remedy for beestings as well as quite a few other skin eruptions that present themselves in similar ways. Now here’s where a homeopath loses the staunch pragmatist, who innocently asks why she would want to consume dried up bees, or mercury, or arsenic, or any of the other potentially toxic homeopathic substances.

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Without beating around any bushes, here’s the answer: if you were to crush up the homeopathic pill called Apis mellifica and place it under a microscope, you would not find any molecular traces of the original bee. At most, you would find sugar and an edible binder of some kind. What was once the bee has been diluted in hundreds, maybe thousands of times more water than original material and then dispensed as a remedy, which, from my own experience and that of thousands of others, works wonders. Why? No one really knows for sure. But it most likely has to do with the essence of the bee, that energetic implant of the bee that is left behind, something of the bee that we cannot see.

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So, as you can see… with some particularly skeptical customers, or with those who need the support of “proof from clinical studies”, I have good reason to avoid this explanation. For those, I sometimes suggest a good introductory book on homeopathy, such as Household Homeopathy, by Vinton McCabe, or The Complete Homeopathy Handbook, by Miranda Castro, both of which we sell here in the store.

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Some final words of advice on purchasing homeopathics: it’s always best to consult a homeopath. But otherwise, prescribe remedies for yourself judiciously. You might come across something that in your own mind you are certain is the “right remedy”. After my “magical” explanation, people have a tendency to get reckless, thinking, “What harm can be done if all they are is sugar pills?” Even if you’re sure you’ve got the right remedy, start with a low potency. Too high a potency of even the right remedy could cause serious side effects.