Anatomy and Physiology was written to give the big picture view on the complex workings of the human body.

Each month we will be exploring a different system of the human body to get the general idea of how it works.

Interspersed throughout each system we will look at how an herbalist can use this information in relationship to herbal health. In this way we learn not only how the body works, but also a glimpse into the magic of how herbs affect the body.

As we learn how the human body works we can further deepen our understanding of health, healing, and the roles that herbs can play in this process. We can then move from recommending a certain herb for a certain issue to understanding how demulcent herbs can soothe the urinary or digestive tract, or how astringent herbs affect mucosal tissues.

Each section we will be separating the systems in the body for simplicity; however, there is no way to actually do this. Rather than a separatists view, the systems of our bodies are all interconnected, and absolutely impossible to completely separate. I hope you will keep this in mind when reading these.

This Anatomy and Physiology section was written for someone who has not previously studied this area before, but it is my hope that those on an intermediate level will find value in these articles as well.

Following each section there will be a listing of further reading for those of you who are inspired to go deeper into understanding how the human body works.