The Body System: The Skin
How to describe the skin?
Let's start by describing what the skin is: for most mammals like humans our skin is our largest organ, composed of three layers of soft tissue (the epidermis, dermis, and subcutis), that covers our entire body. When we start to describe what skin does as an organ and its effects on our sensory experiences, everything gets more complex. Then we add in how the perception of our skin by others leads to judgements about who we are, our character, and our value as a person, and so much of our health becomes tied up to our skin in a way unique from our other, mostly unseen, organs. The skin is unique from our other organs, too, as a vast social and sensory organ in a constant conversation with the environment around us and within us, and kind physical contact with it as an essential part of our overall health.
As we've explored through our theme, within herbal cultures like traditional western herbalism, observation of the skin is an important part of an herbalist's practice. The skin can indicate underlying infections or disease, allergies, hormonal changes, sleep disruption, dehydration, a person's daily routine (such as extensive sun exposure versus being inside most of the day), age, circulation, and the health of our organs. While the skin should never be seen as a sole indicator of an issue, it's a significant one in the process of trying to read the map of a client's land-body. And that's not even touching upon the ways we adorn our skin with tattoos and makeup, piercings and jewels or the ways our skin changes through scar-creating injuries and illnesses. When starting to explore your relationship with your skin, go slow and easy, allowing things to unfold at the pace of a gentle stroll. Because the skin is so public, even when it is clothed for the purposes of not being observed, starting to connect with your skin on your terms first, with your most kind (or at least kindly neutral) language, can take a lot of effort and patience.
In many ways the skin is a social place full of processes that support healthy connection between people. One of my favorite examples of the skin's social nature is how skin-to-skin touch affects parents and their infant child. When an infant is skin-to-skin with their parent, the parent's skin changes temperature, warming and cooling as needed, to accommodate the needs of the infant who is not yet good at temperature regulation on their own. It's incredible to think that our bodies have evolved to care for the newest and most vulnerable members of our growing human family. It's not surprising then that temperature regulation is a primary function of the skin and each day our skin goes through cycles and seasons of change through sweating, heating, cooling, expanding and contracting our body's surface to regulate our internal systems. The skin is also our largest elimination organ, which goes hand in hand with temperature regulation, using sweat not only to cool but help to produce antimicrobial peptides that protect us from infection, helping to regulate the waters of our body alongside our electrolyte balance. Sweat also helps to remove small amounts of toxins like heavy metals, but since the skin is not our primary elimination organ, we shouldn't be trying to sweat all the time or in prolonged extreme temperatures in an attempt to "detox."
Our skin plays a primary role in feeling comfortable with ourselves and our world which makes things like pressures to look a certain way or our skin not being touched with care that much more painful and hard to heal without therapeutic and mental health support. The social health of the skin - the way a person's skin is talked about and perceived by others as well as oneself - is an important part of my practice with clients. From exploring the ways that supremacy has politicized their skin color leading to real harm in health to examining supremacy beliefs that illness is a moral failing, there is so much caught up in the land of our skin. It's also important to remember that traditional diagnostic tools that rely on the observation of the skin are helpful until they're not - so be mindful of the cultural expectations and biases present within physical diagnosis systems.¹ It's a good reminder to explore how we as practitioners are shaped by our invisible biases through cultures of supremacy that we were raised with and/or under, learning how to spot them within ourselves and in the culture around us. Some maps we need to rewrite and others we need to throw out altogether, letting them be an artifact of the past instead of continuing to guide us into a future none of us want.
In so many ways our skin functions like a sometimes literal, sometimes symbolic map of our internal world and a mirror of our external one. Our constant exposure to all layers of our environment, from the physical to the social and beyond, shape the landmarks of our skin, from pushing and pulling at our tectonic shifts of expected and unexpected transitions to the everyday marks of a life being lived. As you walk along the path over the next two weeks, let curiosity be your guide as you take time to meet again the skin that you're in, spotting the landmarks scattered across the map created through your living. Understanding where we've been and what guided us there only makes us stronger, more prepared, and more compassionate about what we may encounter on the path ahead.
Plant allies of the skin are really all plant allies since any plant that helps bring the body into balance is going to have a beneficial effect on the skin. Vitamin and mineral rich herbs are great skin allies, going hand-in-hand with a rainbow diet full of fresh fruits and vegetables and a gratitude for food and the land and people that grow, transport, and make it. Emollient (herbs that soften and soothe skin) and demulcent (gelatinous or oily herbs that create a protective and healing coating on the skin and mucous membranes) are important skin allies as are alternatives and vulneraries that help repair injuries to the skin from wounds, cuts, and bruises to sunburns and rashes. Herbal treatments that are pleasing to the senses (like herbal oils or herbal baths) as well as promote general skin health are also important not only to the physical skin but our sensory environment.
Paths of Study:
Read about common plant allies of the skin, including common complaints that can be aided by herbal medicine.
Start a list of your most used or easily available skin herbs, writing brief, indications-led descriptions of them like I've created below, to use in your practice.
Create a work of art featuring your chosen skin plant allies.
Explore the astroherbalism traditions of the skin, including learning about the sign (Capricorn) and planet (Saturn).
In addition to skin tonics, explore herbs that help reduce inflammation, support healthy circulation, address specific skin complaints such as eczema or acne, as well as herbs that can support expansive pleasure with oneself and/or with others.
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Remediation: If you're feeling overwhelmed on where to begin, choose one herb to study, reading its plant profile, and if possible, making or purchasing the herb to try as a tea, bath, tincture or other plant-specific remedy. For those of you wanting to explore more of the magickal traditions of skin herbs, be sure to read the magickal use sections of their profiles, and begin to consider how the medicinal uses of the plant can fine-tune your spellwork (i.e. how Rose can both protect and soften our energy through its magick of flower and thorn versus Lady's Mantle's ability to bring extra energy to any magickal working).
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Footnotes
For example, some facial diagnosis traditions will point out all sorts of dire things about the dark circles under the eyes, whereas it's normal for many groups of people - like those with South Asian heritage - to have naturally dark circles around the eyes. These dark circles are a feature of inherited traits and not an indication of poor health or lack of sleep.
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