Between You & The Moon’s Glossary of Terms and Concepts
There are certain concepts that we use to describe the supportive skin care process which may be unfamiliar to you, but when put together they complete an alternative paradigm to what many people take as skin care “facts.”
Here are some of these concepts outlined below:
Supportive Skin Care: Supportive skin care is a method of skin care that works with the natural process of your body in order to achieve healthy, radiant skin. Supportive skin care encourages complete healing of the underlying problem(s) while providing topical support to prevent scarring, irritated skin and further eruptions, allowing the body to find it’s own happy balance.
The Functional Skin Care Line is Free from Artificial Chemicals:
At Brooklyn Herborium, we also believe that truly supportive skin care can be provided by nature and is possible with no artificial chemical preservatives. We make it possible to provide you and your clients with a 100 percent chemical-free facial and Home Care Regimen by keeping each element separate and combining them properly before you apply them to the face.
Suppressive Care/Supportive Care: In our method of holistic skincare, we ascertain that the products we make encourage the skin’s natural ability to heal while supporting its natural processes. Suppressive Care merely stops the symptoms (for a little while) and pushes the problem underground—only to return again when the suppressive force no longer works or is removed. Other methods usually look at a problem or blemish and try to kill it, punish it, dry it out or push it back in. We believe this only leads to irritated skin, longer healing times and pimples that keep returning again and again.
Do You Suppress or Support Your Skin?
Release and Resolve: (Better Out Than In!) We consider most “new” pimples as starting off life as a “Stress Bump” coming from the skin acting as an organ of elimination (one of its natural functions). Therefore, when a Stress Bump (also referred to as a heat bump, papule or histamine bump) starts to feel itchy or peek out from under the skin, the supportive skin care process encourages it release outwards to to resolve. We encourage the use herbs and oils to dissolve it and clay and charcoal to draw it out and and allow it gently move on. We discourage the use of anything to suppress it or dry it out, including: salicylic acid, tea tree oil, lemon juice or alcohol in an attempt to “kill” it—because there really is nothing to kill, just another little part of you that needs some assistance releasing.
One Month for Every Year: It is generally recognized in herbal medicine and by holistic practitioners that it takes one month of supportive care for the body to resolve every year of suppressive care. This means that when you stop suppressing your skin’s natural healing processes, the “heat” that your body has been trying to eliminate will come to the surface and may re-appear (see The Ghosts of Pimples Past) for some time after beginning non-suppressive home care. Thankfully, though, when one is following the BYATM regimen , the bumps rarely become pimples and can be removed easily with a facial.
Cycles of healing/Healing spiral: Our skin has about at 28 day cycle. It gets longer as we get older. When we look at healing as a cycle, we may get caught in the idea of healing as a balancing act or a treadmill. We want to break out of this cyclical thinking and start to look at healing as a spiral.
The Ghosts of Pimples Past: When papules/pimples have been suppressed, they keep returning to the surface ready to break out again—only to be suppressed again! When you stop suppressing them, you can be certain that many will come to the surface usually as little underground lumps—BUT—if you are following a supportive skin care regimen, they will heal quicker and be easier on you than if you were using harsh treatments.
"SKINTESTINES" + External Biome/Internal Biome. Imagine the skin as one big mobius strip. There’s skin on the outside that goes over your lips and down your throat and into your esophagus and stomach, passes through the small intestine and then the large intestine and out the anus back to skin again. Perhaps our gut is just our skin turned inside out...or maybe it’s our skin that is the gut on the outside! Either way, there is a huge colony of microbes (both beneficial and malicious) that reside there. If they get out of wack, the bad guys take over and you have all kinds of problems. (See Biome Rehabilitation)
Oil Bonds to Oil, therefore the oil cleansing method is a gentle and effective method of removing make-up and cleaning the skin. We prefer to use large molecule oils that are similar in structure to the skin’s natural sebum, making NO EVIL a better choice than something like sweet almond oil or coconut oil. Think about this: when you have burned food onto your cast iron skillet, how do you clean it? Soap and water with scrubbing is a BAD choice, as it will not work well and destroy the finish of your cast iron. Instead, heat the pan with oil and let it sit a little before you gently wipe the grime away.
Nourishment or Punishment? Gentle healing and guidance bring lasting results and you don’t have to continually repair the damage from overzealous persecution. Oh how often do we see “skin problems” from people trying to punish their skin for somehow being “bad”. They come in and say they have bad skin and therefore need to give it a good spanking in order to straighten it out. They want a strong chemical peel with microdermabrasion and then a ton of extraction and some more microderm...am I right? We try to foster self-love by encouraging skin-kindness and a nourishing environment.
Stress Bumps: The body has 4 methods of Elimination: bowels, urine, breath, and skin. When the body is trying to eliminate certain metabolic wastes though the skin and it is having a hard time doing so (due to various reasons) bumps may show up in the area. This is due to the compound effect the immune system is having on trying to release the offending toxin.
Harmony Zones: Most traditional and holistic modalities have a specific map that shows a correlation between internal stressors and points or areas where they relate to on the face, heads, ears, or feet. Though each culture's map may be different, there are many similarities. The Between You & the Moon Method projects the organs of the torso over facial features and then divides each are by the body system is corresponds with. Though not perfect, it matches up very well with the Ayurvedic system of the chakras-why reinvent the wheel?
Facial Point Stimulation: The purpose of facial point stimulation is to increase circulation to the many “points” that pass through our face. These coincide with acupuncture points, energy meridians, and various other modalities of healing. The process involves using a tool with a rounded point (Our Unique stainless steel FPS Wands, healing stones or simply fingertips/knuckles) to gently move between points and along areas that correspond with Harmony Zones, giving a gentle “Breath” at each point in order to stop blood flow and then release it, allowing it to flood the point in a quick rush. It feels absolutely amazing.
Anti-Aging: There’s only one thing that will stop the aging process…and that’s pretty morbid. And, by the way, you can be too rich and too thin—when it comes to your skin. The more you that “thin” your skin to make it look younger (whether chemically or physically) the more susceptible you leave your skin to sun damage! Conversely, some of these “rich” creams with a ton of active ingredients and transdermal delivery systems seem to do nothing but irritate (we may say "confuse") the skin. We offer, however, rituals that assist in maintaining radiance at any age which we highly encourage to keep the skin supple, healthy, and vibrant.
You Can’t Fool Mother Nature: This is the Brooklyn Herborium go-to philosophy for a myriad of both skincare and life beliefs, but we seem to use it most often when asked about Sun Protection. We do not include an SPF in our line, but we highly encourage protecting yourself from the elements. Wear a hat.
There are certain concepts that we use to describe the supportive skin care process which may be unfamiliar to you, but when put together they complete an alternative paradigm to what many people take as skin care “facts.”
Here are some of these concepts outlined below:
Supportive Skin Care: Supportive skin care is a method of skin care that works with the natural process of your body in order to achieve healthy, radiant skin. Supportive skin care encourages complete healing of the underlying problem(s) while providing topical support to prevent scarring, irritated skin and further eruptions, allowing the body to find it’s own happy balance.
The Functional Skin Care Line is Free from Artificial Chemicals:
At Brooklyn Herborium, we also believe that truly supportive skin care can be provided by nature and is possible with no artificial chemical preservatives. We make it possible to provide you and your clients with a 100 percent chemical-free facial and Home Care Regimen by keeping each element separate and combining them properly before you apply them to the face.
- All products in the Functional Skin Care line and Apothecary line are additive and artificial chemical-free.
- The BYATM Advanced Skin Care line is supportive in the way that it provides for the skin and trusts the body's natural intelligence so that it may do the work for itself, but has been formulated to be used like the more conventional skin care products that people are used to seeing. This makes it an easier transition for those who are not quite ready (physically or emotionally) to dive into the deep green! In this case, many of the products DO have and emulsifier and preservative system. See ingredient cards for information on these products. Of course, some advanced products are also free from artificial chemicals because they CAN be.
Suppressive Care/Supportive Care: In our method of holistic skincare, we ascertain that the products we make encourage the skin’s natural ability to heal while supporting its natural processes. Suppressive Care merely stops the symptoms (for a little while) and pushes the problem underground—only to return again when the suppressive force no longer works or is removed. Other methods usually look at a problem or blemish and try to kill it, punish it, dry it out or push it back in. We believe this only leads to irritated skin, longer healing times and pimples that keep returning again and again.
Do You Suppress or Support Your Skin?
Release and Resolve: (Better Out Than In!) We consider most “new” pimples as starting off life as a “Stress Bump” coming from the skin acting as an organ of elimination (one of its natural functions). Therefore, when a Stress Bump (also referred to as a heat bump, papule or histamine bump) starts to feel itchy or peek out from under the skin, the supportive skin care process encourages it release outwards to to resolve. We encourage the use herbs and oils to dissolve it and clay and charcoal to draw it out and and allow it gently move on. We discourage the use of anything to suppress it or dry it out, including: salicylic acid, tea tree oil, lemon juice or alcohol in an attempt to “kill” it—because there really is nothing to kill, just another little part of you that needs some assistance releasing.
One Month for Every Year: It is generally recognized in herbal medicine and by holistic practitioners that it takes one month of supportive care for the body to resolve every year of suppressive care. This means that when you stop suppressing your skin’s natural healing processes, the “heat” that your body has been trying to eliminate will come to the surface and may re-appear (see The Ghosts of Pimples Past) for some time after beginning non-suppressive home care. Thankfully, though, when one is following the BYATM regimen , the bumps rarely become pimples and can be removed easily with a facial.
Cycles of healing/Healing spiral: Our skin has about at 28 day cycle. It gets longer as we get older. When we look at healing as a cycle, we may get caught in the idea of healing as a balancing act or a treadmill. We want to break out of this cyclical thinking and start to look at healing as a spiral.
The Ghosts of Pimples Past: When papules/pimples have been suppressed, they keep returning to the surface ready to break out again—only to be suppressed again! When you stop suppressing them, you can be certain that many will come to the surface usually as little underground lumps—BUT—if you are following a supportive skin care regimen, they will heal quicker and be easier on you than if you were using harsh treatments.
"SKINTESTINES" + External Biome/Internal Biome. Imagine the skin as one big mobius strip. There’s skin on the outside that goes over your lips and down your throat and into your esophagus and stomach, passes through the small intestine and then the large intestine and out the anus back to skin again. Perhaps our gut is just our skin turned inside out...or maybe it’s our skin that is the gut on the outside! Either way, there is a huge colony of microbes (both beneficial and malicious) that reside there. If they get out of wack, the bad guys take over and you have all kinds of problems. (See Biome Rehabilitation)
Oil Bonds to Oil, therefore the oil cleansing method is a gentle and effective method of removing make-up and cleaning the skin. We prefer to use large molecule oils that are similar in structure to the skin’s natural sebum, making NO EVIL a better choice than something like sweet almond oil or coconut oil. Think about this: when you have burned food onto your cast iron skillet, how do you clean it? Soap and water with scrubbing is a BAD choice, as it will not work well and destroy the finish of your cast iron. Instead, heat the pan with oil and let it sit a little before you gently wipe the grime away.
Nourishment or Punishment? Gentle healing and guidance bring lasting results and you don’t have to continually repair the damage from overzealous persecution. Oh how often do we see “skin problems” from people trying to punish their skin for somehow being “bad”. They come in and say they have bad skin and therefore need to give it a good spanking in order to straighten it out. They want a strong chemical peel with microdermabrasion and then a ton of extraction and some more microderm...am I right? We try to foster self-love by encouraging skin-kindness and a nourishing environment.
Stress Bumps: The body has 4 methods of Elimination: bowels, urine, breath, and skin. When the body is trying to eliminate certain metabolic wastes though the skin and it is having a hard time doing so (due to various reasons) bumps may show up in the area. This is due to the compound effect the immune system is having on trying to release the offending toxin.
Harmony Zones: Most traditional and holistic modalities have a specific map that shows a correlation between internal stressors and points or areas where they relate to on the face, heads, ears, or feet. Though each culture's map may be different, there are many similarities. The Between You & the Moon Method projects the organs of the torso over facial features and then divides each are by the body system is corresponds with. Though not perfect, it matches up very well with the Ayurvedic system of the chakras-why reinvent the wheel?
- This method transcends traditional face mapping techniques by allowing the practitioner to gain a better understanding of the client's overall health while simultaneously utilizing Facial Point Stimulation/The Alignment Technique, Harmony Zone Toning Movements, and our overall methods for relieving the "stress bumps" that may occur in these Harmony Zones.
Facial Point Stimulation: The purpose of facial point stimulation is to increase circulation to the many “points” that pass through our face. These coincide with acupuncture points, energy meridians, and various other modalities of healing. The process involves using a tool with a rounded point (Our Unique stainless steel FPS Wands, healing stones or simply fingertips/knuckles) to gently move between points and along areas that correspond with Harmony Zones, giving a gentle “Breath” at each point in order to stop blood flow and then release it, allowing it to flood the point in a quick rush. It feels absolutely amazing.
Anti-Aging: There’s only one thing that will stop the aging process…and that’s pretty morbid. And, by the way, you can be too rich and too thin—when it comes to your skin. The more you that “thin” your skin to make it look younger (whether chemically or physically) the more susceptible you leave your skin to sun damage! Conversely, some of these “rich” creams with a ton of active ingredients and transdermal delivery systems seem to do nothing but irritate (we may say "confuse") the skin. We offer, however, rituals that assist in maintaining radiance at any age which we highly encourage to keep the skin supple, healthy, and vibrant.
You Can’t Fool Mother Nature: This is the Brooklyn Herborium go-to philosophy for a myriad of both skincare and life beliefs, but we seem to use it most often when asked about Sun Protection. We do not include an SPF in our line, but we highly encourage protecting yourself from the elements. Wear a hat.
Between You & The Moon Holistic Philosophy and Paradigm Basics
Here at Brooklyn Herborium, we have created a lovely, intelligent skin care line and paradigm to help you (or your clients) reach their goals of simply beautiful, healthy skin.
“All types of healthy skin resemble each other, each instance of unhealthy skin is unhealthy in its own way.”
The Anna Karenina principle describes a situation a deficiency in any one of a number of factors dooms it to failure. Consequently, a successful endeavor is one where all of the basic needs are being met, and deficiencies are avoided. The name derives from Leo Tolstoy’s book Anna Karenina, which begins: Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.
This idea may begin to explain why everyone’s path is unique in terms of regaining healthy, happy skin as there are many pieces that need to come together. But it also gives us a firm foundation in identifying which of the skin’s actual NEEDS are not being met by looking at what is going wrong.
What IS Healthy Skin Anyway?
Though it is difficult to define what makes up healthy skin, we can usually identify it when we see it. It just functions well. Much of the time, however, products acting as drugs are being used in order to make the skin appear to be healthy when, in fact, it isn’t. In this case, the skin seems fine--or even “under control”, but never quite healthy. It doesn’t have that same vibrancy that truly healthy skin has.
Healthy skin performs its six basic functions (Protection, Heat Regulation, Absorption, Secretion, Elimination and Sensation) reasonably well most of the time. If the skin is functioning at 80%, 80% of the time, that’s pretty good. Incredibly Good Skin functions over 90%, 90% of the time. The great thing is, once we get the momentum rolling, unhealthy skin starts functioning better and better until it hits a tipping point--and then it’s only a matter of continuing the process consistently over time until it becomes incredibly good 90+% of the time.
What our products do:
Regular use of our products in the manner that we recommend is meant to provide the skin with all of the basic needs that it can obtain topically, limiting or completely avoiding disfunction due to oil/water deficiencies, cellular communication problems, or degradation of the defensive line.
What our products do not do:
Our products are not drugs, nor are they herbs acting as drugs. They are not meant to control the body, suppress it’s natural functions, or destroy anything. This is an “and/in addition to” type paradigm, not an “either/or” paradigm and we focus on nourishing, not controlling.
This idea may begin to explain why everyone’s path is unique in terms of regaining healthy, happy skin as there are many pieces that need to come together. But it also gives us a firm foundation in identifying which of the skin’s actual NEEDS are not being met by looking at what is going wrong.
What IS Healthy Skin Anyway?
Though it is difficult to define what makes up healthy skin, we can usually identify it when we see it. It just functions well. Much of the time, however, products acting as drugs are being used in order to make the skin appear to be healthy when, in fact, it isn’t. In this case, the skin seems fine--or even “under control”, but never quite healthy. It doesn’t have that same vibrancy that truly healthy skin has.
Healthy skin performs its six basic functions (Protection, Heat Regulation, Absorption, Secretion, Elimination and Sensation) reasonably well most of the time. If the skin is functioning at 80%, 80% of the time, that’s pretty good. Incredibly Good Skin functions over 90%, 90% of the time. The great thing is, once we get the momentum rolling, unhealthy skin starts functioning better and better until it hits a tipping point--and then it’s only a matter of continuing the process consistently over time until it becomes incredibly good 90+% of the time.
What our products do:
Regular use of our products in the manner that we recommend is meant to provide the skin with all of the basic needs that it can obtain topically, limiting or completely avoiding disfunction due to oil/water deficiencies, cellular communication problems, or degradation of the defensive line.
What our products do not do:
Our products are not drugs, nor are they herbs acting as drugs. They are not meant to control the body, suppress it’s natural functions, or destroy anything. This is an “and/in addition to” type paradigm, not an “either/or” paradigm and we focus on nourishing, not controlling.
- If you are using a “controlling” product and you suddenly stop, is is reasonable to assume that things just may go “out of control”, so start slow and plan accordingly if this is the case.
- Using our products and philosophies in this manner, it is unlikely that there would be a drug interaction if you do have to also use a medicated product. Consult your doctor if you have any concerns.
Supportive Care: Brooklyn Herborium-style Herbalism
Rather than trying to work against either a pathology or the body’s immune response, we believe that the body is intelligent and we assist it by giving it what it needs in order to do it better and more comfortably. When all of the needs are being met reasonably well, the body is in balance because it has equanimity.
This type of equanimity is not the same thing as the back and forth balancing act which keeps you constantly at the edge of imbalance. Equanimity comes from getting all of the basic needs met (Body, Mind & Spirit) in order to function properly. You can't do it in one hour or one day or with one product or lifestyle change. The first step moving in the direction the body is already heading towards, believing that it knows what it's doing in order to heal you.
From this perspective, we do not consider symptoms to be just a sign, or a way that the "body is telling you that something is wrong”. We recognize the symptoms as a process that the body is actively (and purposely) doing in order to resolve the problem. Perhaps the symptom is actually the cure.
This type of equanimity is not the same thing as the back and forth balancing act which keeps you constantly at the edge of imbalance. Equanimity comes from getting all of the basic needs met (Body, Mind & Spirit) in order to function properly. You can't do it in one hour or one day or with one product or lifestyle change. The first step moving in the direction the body is already heading towards, believing that it knows what it's doing in order to heal you.
From this perspective, we do not consider symptoms to be just a sign, or a way that the "body is telling you that something is wrong”. We recognize the symptoms as a process that the body is actively (and purposely) doing in order to resolve the problem. Perhaps the symptom is actually the cure.
Supportive Care meets the body where it is at and supports it in continuing on the healing path while ensuring that all of it’s basic needs are being met in order to function optimally.
Supportive Care has long been practiced without a name. It is the invisible art of finding equanimity by meeting one’s basic needs which helps the body to function well. It has traditionally been the job of mothers, wives, and other wise women healers. Functional Herbalism has no intention of replacing doctors or using herbs to practice medicine. It avoids using herbs as drugs and instead honors herbal allies as nourishment, management, and gentle guides to nudge us back towards the path of health.
Most of the medicine practiced by doctors and the current medical profession is considered allopathic medicine or allopathy, meaning that diseases or pathologies (“that which causes suffering”) are treated by producing a condition incompatible with or antagonistic to the condition to be cured or alleviated. Anti-inflammatories and antibiotics are two examples of this. Alternative medicine tends to say the same thing, but uses alternative methods (such as herbs or diet) instead of drugs while also introducing “add or avoid” tactics.
Allopathic medicine uses tactics that control, suppress, and kill. Many of these methods or medications can do more than one of these things at a time. While we recognize that you can keep a problem under control by use of force, coercion, and manipulation, we also acknowledge that (similar to relationships and politics) these tactics won't actually solve the underlying issues or create health. Allopathic methods can be truly life-saving and we are grateful to have them as an option when they are necessary, but there are many cases where they simply don’t work.
Most of the medicine practiced by doctors and the current medical profession is considered allopathic medicine or allopathy, meaning that diseases or pathologies (“that which causes suffering”) are treated by producing a condition incompatible with or antagonistic to the condition to be cured or alleviated. Anti-inflammatories and antibiotics are two examples of this. Alternative medicine tends to say the same thing, but uses alternative methods (such as herbs or diet) instead of drugs while also introducing “add or avoid” tactics.
Allopathic medicine uses tactics that control, suppress, and kill. Many of these methods or medications can do more than one of these things at a time. While we recognize that you can keep a problem under control by use of force, coercion, and manipulation, we also acknowledge that (similar to relationships and politics) these tactics won't actually solve the underlying issues or create health. Allopathic methods can be truly life-saving and we are grateful to have them as an option when they are necessary, but there are many cases where they simply don’t work.