Alternative/Natural Health Courses/Certifications?

[DivineSoda]

Does anyone here have experience with quality educational courses on natural/alternative health? I've developed an interest and understanding in natural health, which includes nutrition, supplementation, alternative therapies, etc.. and I even attended a 10 week training course at Hippocrates Health Institute a couple years ago. But I would like to go deeper in my knowledge. 

My goal is to deepen my knowledge as I continue working in the vitamin/supplement department of a natural health food store. I can then work this knowledge into my side project where I create content to help others improve their health. I don't know if this is exactly my true path, but I would like to go further in order to find out. 

I have a feeling I should just be reading more books on the subject, but I just haven't lately as my reading time has been spent on other books. Do you feel like more reading and self-study is the best course of action, or is it reasonable at this stage to at least consider some online courses? If so, any recommendations? 

Thanks in advance for your help! 

[bonesurfer]

I do think that reading and self-study are the best courses of action in your case. Taking on a multiple month project before reading a few books is putting the cart before the horse. I became a chiropractor without considering whether or not I loved the work first. Fail fast. Having said that, I'm a big fan of the functional medicine movement. Some literature I can recommend includes:

The Longevity Diet by Valter Longo

The Neurogenesis Diet and Lifestyle by Brant Cortright

The Disease Delusion by Jeffrey Bland

The Autoimmune Fix by Tom O'Bryan

[Michael569]

I think Naturopathy is an amazing blend of the traditional and herbal medicine with the modern evidence-based medicine and nutritional science. 

Functional Medicine is also pretty neat. 

[Toan]

@DivineSoda i share your interests. do you have a recourse for the 10 week course you did? and how it went for you and how much it did cost?

Thanks

[Equanimitize]

Maybe you’d be interested in Chek Institute for holistic health and wellness courses and certifications.   

He has tons of courses and goes deeper than the surface. 

Even has a course on how to use marijuana in a conscious way that supports growth and development. 

[tezk]

On 04/10/2019 at 6:30 PM, Michael569 said:

I think Naturopathy is an amazing blend of the traditional and herbal medicine with the modern evidence-based medicine and nutritional science. 

Functional Medicine is also pretty neat. 

Hey Michael, just curious what your opinion on this is today? Lot's of people especially those from modern medicine backgrounds think natural medicine, TCM, herbalism, functional medicine, etc is total bogus.

In my experience it has been very powerful (certain herbs/medicinal shrooms i..e, cordyceps have been lifechanging, nutrition therapy i.e., D3, NAC, Bs, methylation i.e., SAMe & vitamin Bs, leaky gut hypothesis -> I do better on an animal-based diet but slowly increasing the foods I can eat as I experience more & more healing), but I do admit I've been very liberal and perhaps slightly reckless in my approach to healing & experimenting with different things given that I was suffering so much. 

I've been thinking about building a potential life purpose in this field, but can't help feel a lot of mainstream medicine think it's complete BS and quackery. It's super discouraging. 

Appreciate any response & your view point. 

Edited September 6 by tezk

[Michael569]

5 hours ago, tezk said:

Hey Michael, just curious what your opinion on this is today? Lot's of people especially those from modern medicine backgrounds think natural medicine, TCM, herbalism, functional medicine, etc is total bogus.

In my experience it has been very powerful (certain herbs/medicinal shrooms i..e, cordyceps have been lifechanging, nutrition therapy i.e., D3, NAC, Bs, methylation i.e., SAMe & vitamin Bs, leaky gut hypothesis -> I do better on an animal-based diet but slowly increasing the foods I can eat as I experience more & more healing), but I do admit I've been very liberal and perhaps slightly reckless in my approach to healing & experimenting with different things given that I was suffering so much. 

I've been thinking about building a potential life purpose in this field, but can't help feel a lot of mainstream medicine think it's complete BS and quackery. It's super discouraging. 

Appreciate any response & your view point. 

 I think I still agree to that to some extend but I no longer consider naturopathy the best way to study health from a non-medical perspective. There is too much funny business being thought there and lot of it is either outdated knowledge or just wrong. 

That being said, I still think naturopathy combined with a good degree of nutritional therapy as a part of some sort of integrative wellness approach is the way to go for anyone who doesn't want to go directly to medicine. You can take the best of all worlds while leaving the quacky bits on side. 

Mainstream medicine isn't a bogus but its lack of holism is its greatest blind spot, especially treatment of chronic disease where you can neither operate nor give quick medication to remedy. If modern medicine had an integrative approach embedded into it, it would be phenomenal. 

In terms of the life purpose direction, there is many ways to take it. I studied nutritional therapy at the naturopathic college so naturally portion of my education was outdated nonsense and I had to correct my knowledge over the years but overall that 3-year study was the best 3 years of my past decade and I'd do it again. Not to mention being one of 2 guys in a class of 30 beautiful and health conscious women was amazing!

I'd encourage you to pursue that journey if you feel that calling and you feel like you have a right value set to want to do that. Its not easy to find clients and build a business but when it works and you see a client undergo a journey that you've helped them build, entering the process unwell and leaving it changed and in a better shape, there isn't much in terms of human experience that can beat that.  

Hope that helps

Edited September 6 by Michael569

[tezk]

On 06/09/2024 at 5:23 PM, Michael569 said:

 I think I still agree to that to some extend but I no longer consider naturopathy the best way to study health from a non-medical perspective. There is too much funny business being thought there and lot of it is either outdated knowledge or just wrong. 

That being said, I still think naturopathy combined with a good degree of nutritional therapy as a part of some sort of integrative wellness approach is the way to go for anyone who doesn't want to go directly to medicine. You can take the best of all worlds while leaving the quacky bits on side. 

Mainstream medicine isn't a bogus but its lack of holism is its greatest blind spot, especially treatment of chronic disease where you can neither operate nor give quick medication to remedy. If modern medicine had an integrative approach embedded into it, it would be phenomenal. 

In terms of the life purpose direction, there is many ways to take it. I studied nutritional therapy at the naturopathic college so naturally portion of my education was outdated nonsense and I had to correct my knowledge over the years but overall that 3-year study was the best 3 years of my past decade and I'd do it again. Not to mention being one of 2 guys in a class of 30 beautiful and health conscious women was amazing!

I'd encourage you to pursue that journey if you feel that calling and you feel like you have a right value set to want to do that. Its not easy to find clients and build a business but when it works and you see a client undergo a journey that you've helped them build, entering the process unwell and leaving it changed and in a better shape, there isn't much in terms of human experience that can beat that.  

Hope that helps

Cheers mate for the reply.

When you say degree of nutritional therapy, do you mean just a bachelors of nutrition in general? Here in Aus we don't have degrees in nutritional therapy as far as I know, unless maybe from a niche naturapathic uni.

Also, I wasn't saying mainstream medicine is bogus, more so that mainstream medicine THINKS that natural medicine is bogus. Haha. But agree with the points you made there.

[Michael569]

@tezk hey, sorry. When I said degree, I meant certification lol, my bad. Nutritional Therapy is not an academic degree. It is a certificate received after completing the 3-year course. It includes both academic part and clinical Practice to allow the practitioner see real clients but it is not as strictly regulated as dietetics for example and NTs cannot work in hospital, diagnose nutrition related conditions etc. but I don't mind that, as long as you're careful about what you can and can't do (and say), you're fine.